Greem had previously thought that the only way one could expand the upper limit of their Spirit was through some specially concocted Spirit Potions. However, today’s ‘delicacy’ had made him think differently. He now knew that, apart from meditation and Spirit Potions, there was another method which could slowly improve the quality of an Apprentice Adept’s constitution.
Although consuming a large amount of these potions could quickly increase the upper limit of one’s Spirit, the increase would usually result in some side effects. This method would bring harm to the normal functions of other body attributes. However, the ‘delicacy’ that he had just eaten came with no side effects. It would increase his Spirit slowly and would show the same results as meditation.
Greem had been told before that the Mind Concentrating Potion, like the one he had just bought, would increase one’s Spirit at the expense of one’s Physique. Therefore, this potion had to be taken in moderation or else Greem would become like Dark Wood and turn into a living skeleton.
While pondering about how he could combine the delicacy and the Mind Concentrating Potion to yield the best result, a cube of meat suddenly got stuck in Greem’s throat. He couldn’t swallow it or cough it out, so he just picked up a glass of crimson liquid and gulped it down.
As if a flame had entered his mouth and was flowing into his stomach, Greem’s face suddenly turned purple. It seemed as if blood was about to burst from his face.
This… this was the blood of Underground Fire Dragon!
Fire Elementium kept emanating from the meat of Underground Fire Dragon and was absorbed and merged into his hungry body. With great effort, Greem managed to swallow the last piece of meat. He finally couldn’t hold up anymore and lay his face on the dining table. His Spiritual conscious had become totally muddled and paralyzed because of the huge amount of Fire Elementium. He found himself being unable to think clearly.
“Hehe, kid, this is the first truth I wanted to teach you.” Before falling unconscious completely, Greem vaguely heard the loud voice of Hulk. “Only by knowing how to eat properly, can an Apprentice Adept, become a better fighter! Remember this!”
Green didn’t remember a single thing that happened after that. The Fire Elementium exploded in his body like scorching lava melting its way to its destination. It was recklessly rushing through every single blood vessel and vein within his body. The overly-strong Fire Elementium had painted his skin fiery red and made his skin hot enough to burn one’s finger when touched. He was like a human shaped furnace that was on full power.
Clearly, these Fire Elementium, that were full of strong bioactivity, were extremely suitable for human absorption. They were present in a huge amount and pounded through every single inch of his muscles, bones, tendons and blood. They continuously merging themselves into Greem’s body, bathing his entire body in a grand feast of Fire Elementium.
Greem was drunk! He was drunk off Fire Elementium!
…………
When Greem finally woke up, seventeen hours had passed.
The time was accurate to the millisecond, as he had been informed by the Chip.
When Greem awoke, he found that he was lying on a warm, cozy blanket inside of a small single tent.
As soon as he opened his eyes, he felt like he was going to explode.
An unprecedented feeling of satisfaction from his bloodline flooded most of his conscious. Greem felt as if his entire body was trembling and moaning in enjoyment. He felt as if every single bone and muscle were cheering, eager to try out their new strength. His bloodline was fully satisfied for the first time ever. It kept urging him to fight and expel the steady flow of raging strength in his body.
“Chip, what has happened to me? Why am I feeling this way?” Greem had always been a calm man who valued reason before everything else, so he was not accustomed to this unusual impulse.
“Beep. Detected that the Host’s body attributes have all reached the upper limit… also detected a large amount of unabsorbed bioactive Elementium within the Host’s body… The abnormal feeling the Host is coming from the stimulation of these bioactive Elementium… It is suggested that the Host performs fire spell practice at once so that the accumulated bioactive Elementium can be absorbed…”
Damn, it was all because of the overly low endurance limit of his body. It seemed that he just couldn’t bear the excessive nourishment he gained from the delicacy!
Greem instantly bolted up from the blanket. He lightly clenched his fist and immediately felt explosive strength start to gather around his shoulder. For a moment, it made think that he had switched his path to one of a Body Refining Adept.
He lifted the tent flap and exited from it. He realized that he was still in the training camp and had just been thrown in a tent on the west side. It was opposite from the wooden cabin in the east. With his sensitive senses, he could tell that some of these tents were empty, while others were occupied by men who were either meditating or sleeping soundly.
It was the morning of the next day. Many elites in the training camp were conscientiously practicing their magic spells at the edge of the large training field. As Greem watched at the skilful and free way they practiced their instantaneous casting, he couldn’t help himself from starting to want to try out his spell too.
As a matter of fact, instantaneous casting was an ability for matured spell casters.
When an apprentice reached to a certain degree of mastery with a magic spell, they would try to compress or even skip a part of the incantation, while still keeping the continuity of spell casting. The final goal of this laborious training was to be able to cast the spell instantaneously.
Some powerful Adepts didn’t even need to chant the dozens, or even hundreds, of words in a chant. Instead, a few short incantations were all they needed to say to instantaneously cast the spell.
However, compressing a long chant into a short one required the spell caster to spend hours upon hours of restless practice. In addition, a secret magical spell legacy was required.
That was why an Adept family was so important to an Apprentice Adept. Each Adept family would have their own magic spell legacy. Only an apprentice belonging to that Adept family would be able to enjoy the legacies and techniques that were handed down by generations of senior Adepts. This would result in making their path smoother and easier.
Or else, without the aid of such ancient knowledge, an apprentice would have to grope in the dark for everything he tried to achieve. With that, even an apprentice with extraordinary magical talent would still have to waste the precious time he had.
Take Greem as an example. Currently, if he recited one-third of a magic spell, the spell would enter into an irreversible molding process. If this process was interrupted or he stopped casting midway, he would have to withstand a certain degree of backlash. But, for those apprentices who had the legacy from their family, it was like they were cheating. They knew which part they had to stop, and they knew how to stop casting halfway while avoiding the backlash.
Just this alone wasn’t something that Greem could learn by himself. He wouldn’t be able to learn it even if he spent countless years practicing spell casting.
Therefore, this was the advantage of having legacies as their knowledge.
Those apprentices who had learned ‘Free Cast’ could practice their magic spells randomly, and when the spell had almost activated, they would dispel it. They would be able to improve their mastery of the magic spell by repeatedly practicing in this way.
After all, there was a limit to an Apprentice Adept’s Spirit. Without using instantaneous casting or free casting, they would find their Spirit depleted after casting a dozen magical spells. After that, they could only sleep in order to restore their Spirit. But, by using instantaneous casting, they could practice a hundred or even a thousand times every single day.
Hence, the progress of an apprentice who had access to a legacy and Greem, who seemed like a feral child, was vastly different.
Righ
t now Greem didn’t have the time to feel envious or jealous of these apprentices. He brought himself to a corner of the training field and found a large rock as his target. He started to repeatedly cast the latest solidified spell he had: Flaming Spear.
In comparison to the quiet and calm free casting that was going on beside him, Greem’s spell casting practice was like a wild bombardment. Following his loud and clear reciting, he kept firing one Flaming Spear after the other. Things that looked like burning spears kept appearing in his hand and, while making a hissing noise, flew into the large rock that stood a hundred meters away. It exploded and filled the air with loud booms.
The Flaming Spear’s swift and violent physical damage, along with its powerful explosion, instantly flooded the large rock target in a fierce and raging sea of flame. The ear-piercing noise of explosion never stopped even for one second.
If the situation was normal, Greem’s pathetic nine Spirit points would have been depleted after four Flaming Spears. But for some unknown reason, the violent and raging Fire element energy kept emerging from his body. It was so strong that he even felt like his Spirit was going to explode.
Therefore, Greem had no choice but to keep firing Flaming Spears in order to release the tremendous pressure he felt on his Spirit. This resulted in the entire training camp being shocked by him!
Chapter 70
Countless napping apprentices roared furiously as they jumped out of their tents, dark shadows under their eyes indicating their need for sleep, cursing their inconsiderate peer in loud voices. But when they saw the young man in front of a large rock target, they had no choice but to halt their actions and angrily return back to their tents.
Soon, countless magical glows sprung up on the top of the tents. The sleepless apprentices had no choice but to use magic spells to shield themselves from the disturbance outside in order to return to their sweet dreams.
After a full half hour, Greem was breathing heavily and his Spirit level was very low.
Through his delicate senses, he could feel a steady stream of Fire element energy from the depths of his bone and flesh resupplying him with Spirit. This process was much slower than before, and finally at a rate that he could endure.
“How is it? Do you feel better now?” A deep voice suddenly came from behind him.
Greem looked over his shoulder and found Kevin standing there.
“Do you know how many people in this training camp are jealous about the big feast you had yesterday?” His arms crossed, Kevin spoke with a smile on his face. “What you had yesterday was a grand feast of Underground Fire Dragon, which is something many people in this camp dream of having but never even have a chance of tasting. Being treated to a meal by Hulk is something that you should feel proud of, rather than return like a champion from the Underground World!”
“I suppose that the meat is really expensive?” Greem asked, while scratching his head.
“Expensive? Not really! In the market, you can buy 500 grams of fresh Underground Fire Dragon ribs with 100 magic crystals, and a glass of dragon blood only costs 200 magic crystals.”
Though Kevin said in a rather relaxed manner, Greem felt like the man was actually talking through his tightly clenched jaw.
Greem was no longer the same young and inexperienced rookie. He could now clearly understand the true value of magic crystals.
For an apprentice like him, who had come here while carrying out the simple Underground World inspection mission, each trip to the Underground World would bring him a reward of five merit points and ten magic crystals. For an elite apprentice like Kevin, the reward for each mission was roughly ten merit points and 30 to 40 magic crystals.
Taking away the basic expenses of purchasing materials and necessities, an elite apprentice with savings of 200-300 magic crystals was considered a rich man. Otherwise, after yesterday’s bet, why had there been so many elite apprentices clenching their teeth tightly and wishing they could devour him alive?
To be plain honest, after two bets, Greem had taken nearly all of the savings of every single elite apprentice in this training camp. If Hulk had not given out his order, perhaps right as Greem stepped out from this training camp, he would be greeted by countless apprentices waiting to knock him out and rob him!
Even though he had won himself a huge sum of ‘ill-gotten gains’, when Greem heard the actual price of Underground Fire Dragon, he still couldn’t control himself and his face twitching violently.
After holding back for quite some time, Greem finally couldn’t contain himself and let out a raging roar into the sky.
“If I had known that thing was so expensive, I would’ve… I would’ve.. definitely…”
“Definitely not touched it at all?”
“I would’ve definitely eaten more of them!”
“……”
After making fun for a bit, when both men looked at each other again, they actually felt closer.
In fact, since the first day they had met, Greem had been in secret awe of these elite apprentices who had gone through life and death training. Though he had defeated two rather famous Advanced Apprentices, they were actually fighting publicly in an open field. If there hadn’t been a limitation because of the fighting ground or a restriction to the magic approach they could use, Greem, who was just a beginner apprentice, was still too weak.
He was strong because of his Golems; he himself was just too weak.
If he and Dark Wood had been in a thickly forested mountain, Dark Wood, who was an expert on curse spells, would have thousands of ways to drive Greem crazy. And if his opponent had been Kevin, Greem would have definitely died instantly.
There was no way he could have hidden under the ground all day, trying to avoid the enemy’s attack. No matter what, he needed to come back to the surface to eat, drink, and sleep. When he relaxed his vigilance, the enemy would stealthily kill him.
Therefore, though his fighting ability had gained acceptance from most people, Greem knew himself. Maybe he really could pose a threat to most of the people in this training camp, but it would not be fatal, and that’s why the members of this training camp could accept him rather leniently.
If Greem had really been deceived by the glory of his own victories and tried to interact with these people arrogantly, all he would end up with is endless hostility and hatred.
For this very reason, when Kevin expressed his kindness, Greem immediately repaid that with ten times the enthusiasm.
Though Kevin was much older than Greem, he was only about twenty-seven, and was still a young man. Hence, they weren’t too different from each other.
After talking for some time, Kevin pulled out an old sack and gave it to Greem.
“This is your portion after yesterday’s victory. It’s inconvenient to carry so many magic crystals, so I exchanged most of them into a magic crystal card. It can be used in exchange of magic crystals in all Adept stations belonging to the Zhentarim Association. This is much better than carrying a few thousand magic crystals and swaggering through the streets!”
Greem was pleasantly delighted and expressed his gratitude fervently.
“It is just a small matter, there is nothing to thank me for. In fact, I should be the one to say thanks to you! If not for you, yesterday I wouldn’t have been able to earn a small fortune. Haha, you didn’t see how jealous those guys were; it was such an enjoyable moment!”
Greem rubbed his palms, but didn’t know how to continue this conversion. Although it was nice to be friends with Kevin, it seemed that Greem had offended many more guys in this camp!
“Don’t worry, Hulk’s given his order. From now on, you’ll be part of my team. But maybe you didn’t know that, since when Hulk mentioned this, you had passed out and were being carried away from the wooden cabin.” Kevin couldn’t help but let out a loud laugh. Though he was teasing Greem, Greem could still hear an undertone of envy from Kevin’s words.
“Brother Kevin, can you explain the responsibility and powe
r of a camp apprentice?”
“Haha, no problem! Come, let me bring you back to Adept Tower. I’ll tell you the actual situation of this training camp on our way back!”
When Greem took his huge fortune and safely returned to his residence at Adept Tower, he finally had a better understanding of what a training camp was.
The training camp, just as its name implied, was a training camp used to train elite apprentices. But, it was also a collaboration used to maintain the interest of the small size Adept families.
After all, though it was called the Underground Cave, along with the dark and deep Underground World, it also covered the Kerala mountain range and a vast forest full of resources that spanned thirty thousand miles of land. It was also one of the richest regions throughout the entire Dagon region.
Also, the Second Grade Adept who had been sent here by the Zhentarim Association had lived in seclusion inside of the Adept Tower and rarely showed himself in public. As long as it wasn’t a major incident, like the Fallen Adepts that had attacked them on the surface, he never really interfered in anything regarding the Underground Cave and only focused his attention on his own magical experiments.
Occasionally, he would secretly venture into the Underground World, but it was mostly to harvest the knowledge and resources required by his experiment. He rarely got involved in the battle between Adepts from the surface and the Fallen Adepts.
Truly, all seventeen of the First Grade Adepts who ran the Adept Tower of the Underground Cave were the decision makers in every single affair. And behind each of them was an Adept family who was significant in the Dagon region.
Of course, the overall strength of these Adept families was insignificant in the eyes of the Zhentarim Association, as they were only considered small Adept families. But in the Dagon region, they were the local villains who controlled everything. Ordinary human nobles and merchants could only seek the protection from the Adept families; only then could they make their living, bringing in endless profit from the Kerala mountain range.
Age of Adepts c1-1513 Page 48