Age of Adepts c1-1513

by Zhen De Lao Lang, 真的老狼

  The colts were behaving abnormally, but the knights weren't much better either!

  Some witcher-knights started to clutch their throats tightly, painfully breathing as they did so. It felt like their internal organs had been set on fire. The searing pain was unbearable. For one moment, the entire witcher-knight army was in chaos as witcher-knights struggling in pain could be seen everywhere.

  The muscles on Willis' face started to twitch violently.

  Dammit! This wasn't a spell. It was a scheme!

  With their bodies’ exceptional strength and magic resistance, no spell could silently invade the bodies of witcher-knights. However, just looking from above, over half of the six thousand witcher-knights were having an extreme reaction to the ripple earlier. This could only mean that the evil adepts had long ago done something to their bodies.

  Willis knew the only way they could so was through poisoning the food and water in the military camp.

  These idiots! Not realizing it even after they had long been poisoned!

  Willis glared angrily at Windsor, the radiant knight leader standing right beside him. He drew the large knight's sword from his waist and stood tall on the back of the green dragon Aufreyr as he shouted loudly.

  "Eliminating the darkness, protector of the weak, fearless!

  “This is the day we die in battle for our conviction and glory as knights.

  “Charge! Charge! Charge!"

  Something extremely odd happened. As Willis loudly shouted the motto that the witcher-knights firmly believed in, a faint golden radiance, so faint it was hard to be seen, started to glow within his body. The radiance was like a powerful dispelling halo. Wherever it went, the light would instantly cause the witcher-knights to return to normal.

  The knights, now freed from the pain and chaos they were struggling in earlier, did not have elementium sight and naturally could not easily see this golden radiance. They thought of their recovery as an effect of their strength of conviction. They drew their runic longswords, loudly chanting the motto of the knights, and charged forward with all their might.

  As the witcher-knights that chanted the motto slowly increased, the golden radiance began to surround every one of them, so dense it looked as if all of the knights were wearing golden armor. With the help of this golden radiance, most of the plague virus that had been ignited by the mysterious ripples within the witcher-knights’ bodies was eradicated, allowing them to regain their ability to fight.

  Even if there were viruses remaining, most of them were suppressed within the depths of their bodies with no opportunity to cause any trouble.

  Bastard! What was this? Shouting two stupid sentences allowed them to endure the effects of the plague viruses? How are we supposed to fight now?

  At this moment, countless adepts roared and cursed frantically in their hearts. Only Adept Fügen narrowed his eyes and stared at the holy radiance in the distance that had expanded into a massive golden sea. He muttered resentfully in his heart, "The power of faith! Dammit! It's the power of faith!"

  It was only now that he truly understood why the Fourth Grade Willis was called a Holy Knight. It seemed Willis had basic mastery over the use and function of the power of faith, and was already able to use it on a battlefield.

  Much like the elementium powers used by the Adepts, the power of faith was also a kind of power. Moreover, it was a power that was at another level when compared to elementium abilities.

  One could say that elementium powers were the concentration of large amounts of elementium particles, using Spirit as a medium to bind them together and allow them to display their unique traits. However, the power of faith was much more intangible.

  The source of it was the soul. When many souls believed devoutly in a certain idea, an unknown force would naturally gather and concentrate into the manifestation of this idea. Even if it was just a normal wooden carving or a stone statue, as long as there were enough people worshipping it, unknown power would gather around it, allowing it to have mysterious powers that would be incomprehensible to outsiders.

  At this moment, the Fourth Grade holy knight had become the bastion of faith for all of the witcher-knights and was obviously the object of all their faith and devotion. When he loudly chanted the inspiring knights' motto, he lit a fire in the soul of all the witcher-knights.

  The power of faith that had accumulated over decades started to spread, allowing the numerous witcher-knights to be miraculously healed, and allowed them to regain their combat strength.

  Adept Fügen was able to provide the most logical explanation, using his vast knowledge of magic, when faced with this odd phenomenon. However, the witcher-knights involved had no idea that this was the case. Ignorant fools were the most fearless. Perhaps because of this, or perhaps because their hearts and beliefs were sufficiently pure, all of the witcher-knights thought of this phenomenon as a miracle of the great holy knight.

  Thus, their burning conviction became even more resolute and passionate!

  Bright red or blue runic energies started to spread rapidly across their runic longswords as they raised them high above their heads. With ear-deafening roars, the witcher-knights rushed towards the war tower.

  Dammit, we need to find a way to eat away at these knights' power of faith! Otherwise, these fellows protected by the power of faith were like a bunch of knights bearing powerful energy shields. Even all the adepts added together would not be enough to stop their ferocious attacks.

  Adept Fügen roared loudly in his heart while twisting the snake-eye ring on his finger, sending a message to a person in the distance.

  "We are all counting on you! Find a way to blunt the knights' edge! The clan will compensate you doubly for all the losses that result from this. Do it!"

  Greem, who had been hiding in the forest all along, received Sir Fügen's magical message, and could only shake his head bitterly. The adepts' base might actually fall if he didn't put some effort into this massive battle today. With the skin gone, what can the hair adhere to? Once the base had been destroyed, they, the invading adepts, might not have the chance to successfully retreat back to the clan's pseudo plane.

  Even Greem felt a chill creep within his heart when he thought of being stranded in this alternate world and being pursued by hordes of witcher-knights.

  Screw it! I'll give it my all this time!

  Greem made his decision. His hands reached into the front of his robe and unceasingly tossed out shiny golem summoning cores one after another. As the dense elementium particles quickly gathered, a massive dust cloud rose at the area he was in. The intensity of this earth elementium flux was so great that even Holy Knight Willis, standing at the back of the army, couldn't help but look in Greem's direction.

  Dong. Dong. Dong…

  The sound of heavy footsteps rang out from the dust cloud, as golem after clay golem, as tall as a human, marched out and charged at the witcher-knights' formation.

  It would have been fine if it was only a dozen elementium golems. However, as the yellow dust cloud continued to expand, and the surging clay golems continued to increase, even some adepts who were originally looking on with disdain in their eyes couldn't help but betray a solemn expression.

  This fellow. Through what means was he able to control so many elementium golems at once?

  The yellow dust cloud rumbled as something even more shocking happened. A massive snake made solely of rock and stone emerged from within, quickly slithering outwards. Everyone frowned when they saw its large body, as wide as water tanks, and when they felt the ground tremor.

  But this wasn't over yet.

  One, two, three…

  When five stone serpents emerged from the dust cloud and charged towards the battlefield behind the clay golem army, all of the witcher-knights couldn't help but feel nervous.

  Dammit! How were they so many of them?

  Chapter 222

  The expected collision did not happen!

  Greem hadn't had a brain stroke
yet. He wasn't nearly dumb enough to have the clay golems clash head on with the witcher-knights wrapped in their steel armor.

  Of course, if these were all stone golems instead of clay golems, Greem wouldn't mind appreciating a glorious clash between steel and stone! However, it was probably best to forget it since they were made of clay.

  Clay golem after clay golem sunk into the dirt beneath them before they even made contact with the witcher-knights. Numerous dirt pillars half as tall as a man and as thick as a child's arm rose from the ground, spreading across the path of the knights' charge.

  The witcher-knights were the most powerful force on this plane after all. Each one of them had exceptional riding skills and agility. They commanded the colts under them to leap up and dive low, sometimes even jumping towards a tall tree and bouncing off of it to avoid the impediment of the dirt pillars.

  Moreover, the radiant knights and spellbreaker knights standing at the very front of the formation were using all their strength to let out violent blades of flame and ice, ravaging through all the obstacles on their way forward. The clay golems responsible for hindering the army's progress could only change their battle plan when faced with such powerful enemies. They started to create swamps that covered large areas to slow the enemy down.

  Numerous forests of dirt pillars and endless patches of quicksand and swamps filled the battlefield. Even though the clay golems hadn't killed a single witcher-knight, they had effectively slowed them down and stopped their march forward.

  While the witcher-knights fell into slight chaos, some clay golems would emerge from the woods nearby and attack the enemy using Spear of Mud as well as Earth Spike. Small skirmishes between clay golems and witcher-knights erupted everywhere on the battlefield.

  The clay golems’ ferocious attacks disrupted the neat formation of the knights, splitting the entire battlefield into countless smaller, chaotic battlefields.

  It was unfortunate that the clay golems' attacks were still on the weaker side. The mud spears they threw at the witcher-knights were unable to pierce that layer of golden armor formed by the golden radiance that gathered about the knights. Some clay golems that were unable to escape into the ground in time had even been hacked to pieces of dirt and stone by the furious knights.

  The nearly one hundred clay golems were disappearing at a speed that was visible even to the naked eye!

  The only ones that managed to cause some damage were the five stone serpents. Every time they dug up out from beneath the ground, the rocks and sand they sent everywhere, as well as their savage bites, were able to throw entire knight squads into complete disarray. Regardless of how powerful the knights’ armor of faith was, it wouldn't be enough to endure the twelve-ton weight of the stone serpents' bodies. All of the witcher-knights that were targeted by the stone serpents were inevitably squashed into blood paste.

  However, every time the stone serpents rampaged about the battlefield, their massive bodies would be hacked at by numerous violent knight battle techniques, sending rocks flying everywhere as their bodies slowly cracked and fell apart. If they took too much damage, the stone serpents could only burrow into the ground and wait for their bodies to slowly regenerate.

  Most of the time, this group of pseudo-adept level stone serpents could only throw the enemy lines into disarray. It was impractical to count on them to slaughter the witcher-knights en masse.

  Greem had transferred the battlefield command of these golems to the chip in his mind after he summoned all the golems he had. With the detailed and dynamic commands of the chip's superior computing power, as well as its complete understanding of the overall situation in this battleground, this group of golems might continuously suffer casualties but they also effectively contained the momentum of the knights' army.

  With the aid of the chip, Greem no longer needed to put in his own effort to command hundreds of individual fights. All he needed to do was to focus on himself and live up to his title as a master of pyromancy.

  Greem freely roamed about the battlefield.

  He turned into a terrifying Flame Fiend three meters tall, with violent elementium flames surging about his body, and slowly walked into the battlefield one step at a time. The soft black dirt would be turned into half-molten boiling lava everywhere he went. A red and black path of magma could be clearly seen where he walked.

  Greem gripped the Fire Lord’s Scepter in his right hand and held the Scroll of Voodoo open in his left. The pages of the ancient tome incessantly flipped on its own, adding a sense of mystery to Greem.

  Greem was not willing to use up the six instant-cast spells stored within the Scroll of Voodoo. To maximize his combat strength, he had replaced the spells within it with all kinds of powerful large area-of-effect fire spells such as the devastating Fire Core Explosion and Firestorm.

  Use them to slaughter these witcher-knights before him? Honestly, Greem was not willing to waste it on these small fries!

  Greem slowly strolled forward, lightly waving the Fire Lord’s Scepter in his hand as he did so and lobbing several Magma Fireballs into the areas where the witcher-knights were packed the densest. Meanwhile, Greem blasted the fools that dared to rush at him into pieces with violent Chain Fireballs.

  The armor of faith might be able to help them endure simple spells, but when faced against the continuous bombardment of the Chain Fireballs, even the thickest armor in the world wouldn't be able to save them.

  Brave knights repeatedly charged forward while shouting the knights' motto, only to be blasted to the ground by the exploding fireballs. Before they could even get up, the next fireballs would arrive and cause the damage to quickly stack up, break through the armor of faith, and blast apart the armor on their bodies before they were consumed by the surging tide of fire.

  The witcher-knights were humans with blood and flesh after all. Without the protection of their shields and the blessing of their faith, even the most exceptional magic resistance would be no more than a joke before the savage fireballs!

  Fireballs exploded everywhere, sending blood and flesh splashing in every direction!

  The witcher-knights targeted by the Chain Fireballs had no means of escaping the area that was ravaged by flames. Their bodies, along with the bodies of the magic colts beneath them, would be torn into unrecognizable pieces of flesh in a matter of seconds.

  Moreover, the runic arrows they shot in retaliation were mostly blocked by the Magma Shields constantly spinning around Greem's body. Ever since Greem's protective spell had been upgraded from the Fire Shield, to the Inferno Shield, to the current Magma Shield, his defensive strength had gone up exponentially.

  Now any attack with less than 150 points of damage had no chance of destroying the Magma Shields in one shot. Attacks that dealt less than 150 damage could still deal some harm to the shields. However, the shields quickly regenerated as Greem continuously used his Spirit to repair them.

  As such, even though the Magma Shields had already been filled with runic arrow, they were unable to wear away at its defensive strength.

  Even the occasional arrows that made it through were unable to pierce the magma armor on Greem's body. As intense waves of flame surged out from Greem's body, those arrows would be burned white hot before melting like wax and turning into puddles of molten iron.

  On the other hand, there were witcher-knights that tried to charge forward and engage in close range with Greem. Greem's answered that with a flurry of strikes from his flame whip. The flame whip composed of pure and concentrated flames would cause intense burns wherever it hit a person’s body. If it managed to wrap around a knight's body, Greem would immediately set the person on fire the very next second.

  Greem might be an elementium adept, but when he transformed into the frightening Flame Fiend he would have astounding combat strength that rivalled the actual Abyssal Flame Fiends. Fireballs were his means of attacking from a distance. The flame whip was his answer for fools that tried to close in. Any closer, and Greem would use
his colossal burning executioner's blade.

  A three meter tall flame humanoid waving around a massive executioner's blade made of flame and magma was enough to cut down swathes of enemy without the use of any battle techniques.

  It was such a dominating weapon that even being close to it would cause one to feel an overpowering sense of oppression, as well as a burning sensation that ravaged the entire body. Moreover, Greem's Ring of Fire extended for thirty meters around him and was a domain-type spell. Any living beings made of flesh and blood that came within thirty meters of himself would have to endure fire damage as high as 13 points per second.

  This also meant that a fit, empty-handed human male entered Greem's Ring of Fire, he would die before two seconds had passed. The witcher-knights fared slightly better, but even they could only endure the burning for twenty-seven seconds at the very best. Moreover, this was with the help of the armor of faith. Otherwise this duration would be cut in half.

  Everywhere he went, Greem would leave behind the struggling shapes of countless witcher-knights. And everywhere he walked past he would leave behind the charred remains of squad after squad of witcher-knights.

  Of course, Greem's unscrupulous and bloody killing had drawn the anger of the radiant knights. They slapped their horses and raised their runic longswords, bright as torches, high above their heads and roared as they charged towards him.

  Greem had no intention of confronting radiant knights.

  Every time this happened he would pause for a moment, and with a blast of magical flames his massive flaming body would vanish. The very next second, the terrifying Flame Fiend would appear in another area a hundred meters away.

  The messy, chaotic battlefield was clear as day like an open book in Greem's mind, with the wind critters looking on from above and the clay golems below. Not a single change in any of the battlefields within one and a half kilometers of Greem could escape his perception.

  Every second, countless streams of vague information would flood in from the numerous points of consciousness Greem had established on his golems. And with the chip's filtering and analysis of the massive amount of data, Greem was able to clearly grasp an understanding of the battles around him. This allowed him to constantly go where it was the most advantageous for him.