Age of Adepts c1-1513

by Zhen De Lao Lang, 真的老狼

  It was worth mentioning that in order to hold them captive, Anderson had really put in a lot of effort.

  The rope was made from the skin of a Black Serpent from the East Coast. It was capable of withstanding any Pseudo-Adept level offensive magic spells. In addition to that, among three of them, none was an apprentice with great strength, so it was impossible for them to escape the fetters of the torture chair with only their body strength.

  Together with the distraction coming from the Brain Wash Cap of Gnoll, even if all three of them really became Adepts, they were in a situation where they didn’t have the chance to absorb elemental energy from the outside world and recover their body. They would be just three delicious dishes who had the identity of official Adepts, but not the overall strength of an Adept.

  This place was a small inter-space controlled by Anderson, and he was the highest authority. Without his permission, the trio could never absorb even the tiniest bit of elemental energy. Three Adept level sacrificial offerings who had stepped into the realm of Adepts, yet only had the overall strength of Pseudo-Adept. This was the grand feast Adept Anderson had prepared for himself!

  Through the torture chair, the mutated energies coming from the altar still continued penetrating Greem’s body, pushing him closer and closer to the most frightful abyss. However, even when he was confronted with a crisis of life and death, Greem was still as calm and sober as usual. In fact, his thoughts were far clearer than normal and he could see things far more thoroughly.

  “Alice, why are you taking so long? If you delay further, it is true that I can’t escape from death, perhaps you’ll have to die together with me too!”

  “It is almost… done…. give me another… ten… minutes… these… damn defenses… of the tower… are really tough… to kill…” Alice’s conscious wave that came from the depth of his soul was breaking up. Obviously, she was in the middle of an intense slaughter.

  “Remember, you only have ten minutes. Now, teleport the thing I need over here first!”

  “Damn it… this is insane… why are you… asking things… at this… moment? Rascal… I… awwww…”

  Alice cursed hurriedly, and judging from her last shrill cry, it was obvious that she had unleashed her most deadly strike: Spatial Shatter. Having temporarily wiped clean the enemy around her, she was finally able to seize the opportunity and teleport over the thing Greem needed.

  Greem felt a slight vibration on his palms. While still strapped on the torture chair, he flipped both palms and saw two micro magical arrays, emitting wave after wave of spatial ripples. When these spatial ripples reached a very dense degree, a tiny spatial tunnel was torn open.

  Two faint noises were heard as two objects traveled through the magical arrays, similar to a short-distance teleportation array, and fell into his palms.

  Over the past month, Alice had repeatedly tried all sorts of methods to teleport an object over to Greem’s palm, but they were all blocked off by his elementium shield, protection barrier, or some other similar defensive mechanisms. As she was being pushed to a corner, Alice eventually thought outside of the box and came out with the idea of designing a strange thing: a micro space positioning array.

  The Chip started to work on her idea. With that, a mysterious array, now found on both of Greem’s palms, was produced!

  Relying on the positioning function of the array, it had become simpler for Alice to teleport objects over to Greem. Most of the time, it was as easy as performing a short-distance teleportation herself.

  The item that fell into Greem’s left palm was the summoning core of his Fire Lord golem, while the item fell into his right palm was his favorite weapon: the Fire Lord’s Scepter.

  He had foreseen that all of the equipment and items found on his body would be taken away by Anderson, therefore, long before anything else, he had left both of his ultimate weapons, which could help him turn the situation around, with Alice. When the time was right, he would ask her to teleport them over.

  Now, with his magical weapon and his strongest golem in his hands, it was time to fight Adept Anderson!

  With a gentle swing of the Fire Lord’s Scepter in his right hand, a large gate of flame immediately emerged behind Greem. It was enshrouded with leaping and steaming flame, creating an extremely high temperature. Through the smoky and hazy opening of the gate, one could vaguely see the realm of Fire Elementium, a world of terror purely made up of flames.

  Endless Fire Elementium burst out from the flaming gate; in an instant, they transformed the surrounding space into a sea of flame. Meanwhile, amidst this raging and soaring sea of flame, Greem tossed the summoning core of his strongest golem onto the ground.

  In next seconds, a formidable, tall and burly Fire Lord was born amidst the raging sea of flame!

  After making its debut, the first thing Fire Lord did was wield its huge, flaming lava rock hand and crush the torture chair which Greem was trapped in.

  While stretching his slightly numbed arms, amidst the flame that spread all over his body, all of the frightening wounds on Greem’s body started to close, healed, and eventually, disappeared without a trace. After owning the Flame Body, any place with fire would be his home and he could even conveniently self-heal.

  Adept Anderson was hovering on top of the bloody altar, staring at that little Pseudo-Adept who stood with his back straight. The emotion of fury and resentment in his mind had reached their maximum degree. Because of that powerful gate of flame, the function of the bloody altar had suffered a great distraction. The other two sacrificial offerings on the altar had also started to move and struggle, showing signs of awakening soon.

  Damn it… damn it… damn it…!

  Curses rolled from Anderson’s tongue. Without hesitation, he launched an attack at Greem.

  Hundreds and thousands of wild and ferocious Wind Blades immediately rushed towards Greem.

  Without Greem’s needing to confront the attack personally, the Fire Lord, who occupied nearly half of the space on top of the altar, took two steps forward and unleashed a Firestorm to throw it over to the incoming attack.

  The Wind Blade and Firestorm collided in midair, instantly smearing the surrounding space with a red hue. Countless raging flame and razor sharp wind blades were crashing and slicing each other in the air. Very soon, the difference in their power was revealed in front of everyone.

  The energies contained within the Firestorm were overly divided, and their power was far weaker than of those Wind Blades on the opposite side.

  As a result, sliced by countless Wind Blades that came whistling in before the Firestorm could bring all of its power into play, all the Fire Elementium was churned and shattered into pieces. And after annihilating the Firestorm, the remaining Wind Blades finally caught up to the body of the flaming giant.

  The flaming giant was standing aloft; its leaping flame armor of lava had combined the violence of Fire element and the sturdiness of Earth element. Thus, although the surface of the armor was all scratched up, the source of Fire element in its body remained intact.

  Relying on the protection of this flaming giant, Greem roared out with a loud voice, and he finally summoned the Fire Deity smoothly. Unlike what he usually did, where he always sent the Fire Deity into the battlefield as cannon fodder, Greem actually departed from his normal behavior. He forcefully poked his hand into the chest of the Fire Deity and pulled out a unique fire stone with some indistinct runes.

  He threw his head back and roared again. Then Greem opened his mouth, placed the flaming fire stone inside, and swallowed it.

  It was as if he had just swallowed a mini sun; from his mouth to his throat, and also from his stomach, a dazzling bright light and an intense heat emanated from within his body. It almost transformed him into a transparent and flaming humanoid. After such a strong congregation of Fire Elementium entered his body, driven by Fire element energy of the same origin, numerous magic runes engraved on the surface of his body started to light up, one after ano
ther.

  Greem kept roaring furiously and loudly. Intense heat and dazzling light were emanating from all over his body. An Elementium Flame coming from the source of his soul had finally kindled his body and soul.

  In the past, Greem had been bathed countless of times in the element of fire, yet those were fires produced from the collision between Fire element energy and his Flame Body. But right at this very moment, Greem was kindled by the flame that diffused from the depths of his soul.

  After a long history of learning fire, playing with fire, and researching fire, for the very first time, Greem had touched the inner principles of Fire Elementium and established a slight connection with the Fire element principle residing within the Will of the Plane. And this was the true source that could allow Greem to keep walking further in the path of an Adept.

  “Not enough… this is far from enough! I need more…”

  While letting out a thunderous roar, Greem finally activated the mystical ability the magic rune suit brought to him: the transformation of the Flame Fiend.

  A flaming humanoid far stronger and purer than the flaming giant made his debut in the scene. The two-meter tall body kept expanding and becoming bigger and bigger after being injected with a vast amount of Fire element energy; soon it reached the height of three meters. Meanwhile, a thick fire pillar shot out from the gate of flame behind him, injecting an endless amount of Fire element energy into his body.

  Due to this flaming humanoid drawing and absorbing the Fire element energy in an overly violent, quick manner, the gate of flame nearly couldn’t supply his demand. The flame on the tall gate pillars and the gate itself gradually faded away, exposed an ancient-looking stone frame fully engraved with runes.

  Supported by such vast Fire element energy, Greem once again let out a terrifying roar that shook the entire space. Driven by his powerful will, all of the Fire element energies he absorbed rushed crazily into his Spiritual Domain. In that place, they were repeatedly compressed and tempered, again and again.

  Such degree of fire congregation was no longer something that could be controlled by his mere Flame Body. For every time his Spiritual Domain shook and contracted, the powerful fire energy compressed and tempered by the true form of his spiritual consciousness would bring him devastating fire damage.

  When the strength of the fire damage reached a certain degree, the Flame Body of that lower grade could no longer provide him any resistance toward the damage!

  Every time his true form of spiritual consciousness compressed the fire energy, it was no different than an ordinary human hugging a fire pan that could bring him severe injury. However, there wasn’t any sizzling sound of skin and flesh being burned, the only thing was a severe pain that penetrated the depths of his soul.

  Amidst the severe pain that kept striking him, Greem’s senses had become blunted. Yet, most of the impurities and useless waste found in the true form of his spiritual consciousness were burned off by the dreadful flame. Backed up by the attitude of not fearing pain, and being repeatedly compressed by his spiritual consciousness, the powerful fire energy had finally starting to take its shape. Using that tiny thread of Fire element principal as the core, they crystallized and formed into the conscious core that was required to advance into the realm of an Adept.

  In the middle of a battlefield, Greem had finally advanced and become a Fire element Adept!

  Chapter 155

  Never once before in his entire life had Greem felt so close to the Will of the World!

  In the past, he was always having trouble differentiating between the consciousness of the plane and the will of the world. He kept having the feeling that they was just two different names for the same matter from two different angles. Yet, at this moment when he finally made the advancement and became a Fire element Adept, only then was he profoundly enlightened by the huge difference between the two.

  A plane was an enormous vessel that carried all living beings, a place where all things lived, bred, and expanded. At the beginning when a plane was born, basically the consciousness of the plane had also been born with it. After all, it was just a congregation of consciousnesses produced by all living beings and materials within the plane itself – chaotic and unclear. During this period, due to the consciousness of the plane only possessing a simple instinctive response, without developing a clear and direct self-consciousness, it was generally referred as the consciousness of the plane.

  So to speak, most of the planes within the multi-verse only possessed the consciousness of the plane!

  And it was obvious that the will of the plane was more advanced and possessed higher intelligence than the consciousness of the plane. On the foundation where a plane possessed its own consciousness, when this particular plane developed and expanded to a certain magnitude, the consciousness of the plane would give birth to the will of the plane, which was something similar to the soul of a human.

  Thus, most of the consciousnesses of planes were primitive, naive like a babies who just begun to babble. They would respond to any event that might hurt them, but the process was clumsy and slow. On the other side, the will of the world was in fact, a consciousness of the plane that matured and grown up a little bit, and it had given birth to an independent self-consciousness from the chaotic congregation of consciousness. It was capable of using principles of the plane as its weapon to interfere or adjust any event that happening right within its body.

  The rare few major planes in the multi-verse belonged to this category.

  There was even some more matured will of the worlds, which were able to rely on their preferences to influence and guide those individuals who lived under their protection. Those who do something right would be rewarded and wrongdoings would be punished. Using the power of the world principle, they guided themselves to moving towards the direction they anticipated.

  Throughout the entire multi-verse, there was only one world had given birth to a matured will of the world. It was a lower tier realm infested with foul demons and devils – the World of Abyss.

  Meanwhile, the World of Adept where Greem lived in right now was obviously a major plane who had given birth to its own will of the world. Together, millions upon millions of living beings and billions upon billions of materials within the plane had formed and produced a consciousness of the plane that owned a partial self-consciousness. No matter whether it was a stalk of flower, a shrub of weed, a human being, a stone, regardless the level of their status, whether they were a noble or a mere peasant, irrespective of whether they were strong or weak, they were just a tiny part of this powerful will of the world.

  Apparently, this will of the world was similar to those consciousnesses of the plane born in most of the material planes. It was against the blood sacrificial ritual which would cause a great number of souls in its world to vanish and be used as the sacrificial offering for a foreign world. As the result, with regards to Greem’s behavior of directly fighting against the bloody altar, the will of the world had used the power of principle and given him preferential treatment.

  Or else, with the current capability of Greem’s soul, he would have to face a great challenge if he wished to become an official Adept. According to the Chip’s estimation, if the will of the world didn’t make a concession for Greem, the odds of Greem advancing into the realm of Adept just now was less than 7%.

  According to the information Greem had, usually Adepts would call the process of adapting the principles, using the principles and complying with the guidance from the will of the world in order to obtain personal experience and improved one’s skill, as the ‘feedback of the world.’ And as the matter of fact, such feedback was part of the world principle itself!

  Therefore, it could be said that literally because of the power from the feedback of the world, that Greem was able to complete his Adept Advancement Ceremony!

  Since he had advanced smoothly and became an official Adept, he was now freed from the shackles of the bloody altar. However, when he
stood up with his back straight and ran his eyes around this completely isolated inter-space, he realized that the situation of the battle was still in the worst condition.

  In less than ten minutes, the Fire Lord was showing signs of defeat, as now it could barely defend against the violent bombardment coming from Adept Anderson. As for the other two companions of his, Mary was strapped on a torture chair placed on the other end of the altar, letting out a painful shriek into the sky. It was obvious that her situation wasn’t good at all. Alice had just slaughtered her way into the controlling main hall of the Swampy Tower and was fighting a fierce battle against two Adept level magical beasts. She was now running around busily, chased by the enemies, hence there was no way she could help create trouble.

  As for that Acteon, after receiving an order from Adept Anderson, he had escaped from the torture chair, and was roaring with a deep voice while dashing towards Greem who had just opened his eyes.

  Greem let out a deep and lordly laugh. He stretched his tall and burly stature, moved both arms over his head and unleashed a red force field from his body, covering an area of fifty meters in diameter.

  Right after Evil Bugs leaped into the red force field, an elemental flame appeared out of nowhere immediately coiled up his body. The frightful high-temperature evaporated all the water in his body, which was few in volume, and the scorching hot flame jet roasted his body and made it produce crackling noises. In less than three seconds, his formidable half-bug body was nearly toasted by Greem’s Ring of Fire.

  In a speed faster than he came, Acteon scurried away from this red force field.

  Although he had escaped from it, he had left behind a great number of charred and cracked bug fragments. If not because he ran away in time, even without Greem attacking him personally, just with the Ring of Fire outside of Greem’s body alone would have been enough to roast him into a bug barbecue.

  Acteon spent a long time strolling around the Ring of Fire. He had no courage to take another step into it.