As long as he performed the follow-up support and replenishment well, this adept's tower would stick here like a stubborn nail. The magical creatures would hate its existence, but there would be nothing they could do.
After all, an adept with an adept's tower possessed an overwhelming advantage in every aspect. These advantages were not something that could be overturned by sheer numbers!
However, the three adepts shook their heads when they saw the number of adepts and apprentices inside the tower. The quality and quantity of workforce Greem owned were more than enough to defend, but they wouldn't be enough to go on the offensive. They would probably have a tough time exterminating the magical creatures.
Those magical creature leaders could come back and strike again at any time if they had escaped.
The main reason the three silver-robed adepts had come to such a conclusion was that Greem had stationed his new recruits away from the tower. Dana, Unguja, Eva, the bird demon, and the snake fiend were all outside.
Only Greem, Gargamel, and Meryl stayed inside the adept's tower, along with the three pseudo-adepts– Kodar, Am, and Sabrina. The other apprentices were not going to be of much use against an organized stampede! Therefore, they weren't taken into consideration by the Silver Union adepts.
That was why the three adepts secretly guessed that Greem had used the sea of lava from the lava well to flood the hall and force out the magical creatures.
In doing so, neither side had obtained a real victory. Their hatred for each other would only continue to grow, just as the war would, with no end in sight! Even if this stretch of the Black Forest had any rare resources, they were not going to be able to excavate them under such circumstances properly.
This failure caused the three adepts to lower their assessment of Greem by quite a bit!
"Only three adepts and one of them is a newly-advanced adept. Is the Sarubo Clan incapable of assigning more manpower to help them?" One of the adepts silently communicated with the others using Password of the Mind.
"Don't you forget, this is his personal tower. It's very likely that the clan doesn't support his actions!"
"Then the clan sent him out to die? This is the Black Forest. Build a tower here, and you invite the magical creatures to attack. Could this guy not have known about this beforehand?"
"Who cares?! Our mission is to build and construct an excellent adept's tower per the client's specifications. Don't overthink the other unrelated matters."
The three Silver Union adepts secretly talked amongst themselves as they discussed the maintenance and repair of the tower.
The tower had suffered extensive internal and external damage during the battle. The cost of putting things back into order was not going to be cheap. Moreover, the magical facilities inside the tower were still incomplete. Greem intended to take this opportunity to fill them in.
Of course, he excluded the teleportation array!
Both sides started a fierce negotiation over the cost of the operations. Finally, after the adepts consulted with their higher-ups, the final price was settled at one hundred and sixty-seven thousand magical crystals. The slaves that Greem had purchased the last time had also arrived in Pinecone Town. They were hurrying towards the tower while escorted by mercenaries. It would take them approximately four days to arrive.
One hundred and sixty-seven thousand magical crystals; this was a hefty fee that even some veteran adepts might not be able to pull out. Meryl and Gargamel's face flushed white the moment they heard of the news. They had solemn expressions on their faces the whole time as if their hearts were about to give out at any time.
They had all participated in the process of the tower's construction from nothing.
Building the tower had cost two hundred thousand magical crystals. Defending the assault of the magical creatures had cost one hundred and ten thousand. If they were to add all that to the cost of one hundred and sixty-seven thousand this time, it would mean that Greem had spent nearly five hundred thousand magical crystals in the span of a mouth! All for the sake of constructing his own personal adept's tower!
This number gave Meryl, the newly advanced adept, and Gargamel the wandering adept an oppressively suffocating feeling.
No wonder most adepts were willing to spend their entire lives managing their towers. In the end, it was because they had no choice. An adept's tower was practically a money-eating monstrosity. If left alone without any management, the sheer crystal cost was enough to reduce an adept to tears!
Of course, Greem couldn't produce so many magical crystals at once. He only had thirty thousand on hand. He would pay the rest with 1,100,000 magical stones and large numbers of magical gemstones.
Just handing over the magical stones and the appraisal of the gemstones took a whole day.
The Silver Union adepts couldn't help but change their impression of Greem when they saw the mountains of magical stones in the tower's warehouse. It didn't matter how they looked at it. To have obtained so many magical stones meant that this had been an overwhelming victory.
Had this Adept Greem truly fought off and exterminated the core of the magical creatures' army with just three adepts? The truth was hard to swallow, but the magical gemstones in front of them were as real as they could be. If those magical creatures hadn't been crippled, how would they possibly have allowed the adepts to go in and out of the Black Forest in search of resources?
It couldn't have been that all those magical creatures were dead, could it?!
Little did they knew that their wild exaggerations of a guess were the most accurate answer! However, this answer was just too unbelievable. Even they refuted it the moment they thought of it.
With the help of the Silver Union adepts, the magical facilities of the tower were being filled in at a rapid pace. The numerous fine cracks in the body of the tower had also been easily patched up by the adepts.
Specialists were the best at their work after all!
One had to point out how amazing esoteric adepts were at the field they specialized in; they were gods of their craft. Impossible tasks in the eyes of outsiders were no harder than the flip of a palm for them.
The tower was completely restored in just three days under their ceaseless efforts. The six slaves that Greem had purchased also arrived at the tower on this day.
As the original landmark of Plaguewood was now gone, Greem decided to rename things. After some consideration, he named his adept's tower Fire Throne, and the new underground tunnel as Fire Cave. Once the surface was properly developed, he didn't mind building a city of humans known as Magma City!
Once construction had been completed, Greem handed over the money, and the three Silver Union adepts left Fire Throne, accompanied by a party of mercenaries. Greem threw the two halfling gourmets into the kitchen, the two dwarven smiths into the golem factory, and the two fairies in the magical garden.
The halflings were approximately one meter in height and fifteen kilograms in weight. Their skin was a healthy red shade, while their hair was black and straight while their eyes were brown.
The Silver Union had sent male and female pairs for all the slaves.
The male halfling had longer sideburns, while the female was more slender than the male. Male or female, they possessed excellent cooking skills for preparing food so delicious that it would make you choke on your tongue. Everyone throughout the tower agreed on this!
As for the dwarves... apologies, but Geem couldn't differentiate which was the male and which was the female, even after extensive visual inspection. Both of them were short, stout, with a coarse face and a big beard.
Their bodies were tough like a mountain. Their muscles were hard as a rock, and their temper was just like their looks; stubborn and rough.
That had exceeded Greem's expectations. Who would have known that even female dwarves sported a thick brown beard? It sounded like thunder when their gravely voices boomed out loud.
Greem couldn't help but shiver in disgust when
he imagined a dwarven couple like this climb into bed at night.
The fairies were the exact opposite of the dwarves.
They were only fifty centimeters in height, and both of them were female.
They had frail and slender bodies, pretty faces, pale skin, green eyes, and sharp ears. If they were just a little smaller and had thin wings on their backs, they would look just like the elementium fairies Alice had in her Tower of Fate.
However, the elementium fairies radiated with powerful magical energies. This pair of fairies were letting out a fragrant smell of grass and wood instead.
They were considered plant-attribute magical creatures, and they were skilled at dealing with all sorts of magical plants. That was why they were irreplaceable gardeners that every magical garden needed.
Greem seemed to recall reading something about these fairies in a book somewhere. These small fairies were actually a product of flower fairies and elves that the adepts had kidnapped from an ancient elven empire.
They were a type of lifeform created by magic!
Chapter 426 Change
The sudden appearance of Fire Throne had clearly affected the development of the Black Forest.
Those who felt the greatest of impact were the townsfolk of Pinecone Town.
As one of the border towns of the human settlements, they had always lived in the shadow of the terror of magical creatures. Every time a large-scale stampede broke out from the Black Forest, they would have to rush to request aid from the nearest place: Baldan City. That was because there was an adept's tower located there.
The adept clans that had stakes in Pinecone Town would also send some adepts and apprentices to help repel the stampede. Still, this sort of aid was always limited. These outsider adepts and apprentices would never give their lives for the town if the danger exceeded their expectations.
There had already been two tragic cases of Pinecone Town falling to a stampede of beasts since its inception. And after every tragedy, the adepts would bring in a new batch of migrants to populate the town.
This town was undoubtedly a terrifying place that was both home and horror for the citizens!
However, with the appearance of this mysterious adept's tower, the nearby woods had suddenly become serene like never before.
The magical creatures ravaging the forest had all vanished. Even the number of large predators had drastically fallen. Several mercenary groups had found the courage to go venturing a hundred kilometers deep into the Black Forest, yet they had not seen a single sign of magical creatures.
Some of the known dens of magical creatures had been abandoned. Past hazard zones and no man's lands had turned into safe places where people could come and go. These mercenaries that thrived on adventure started to explore these abandoned caves and tunnels. They worked hard to find the dens of the magical creatures.
For a moment, the mercenaries of Pinecone Town were extremely lively and active. Every single one of their expeditions yielded bountiful results. The apprentice adepts that had spatial belts soon became the most popular individuals in town. Their existence in a party meant that the company could bring back even more spoils from their adventures into the abandoned dens.
Initially, no one knew the cause of all this initially. However, as some mercenary parties slowly extended their expedition range into where Plaguewood once stood, they had the luck of meeting the apprentices stationed nearby. It was only then that they knew that a great adept's tower had been erected at the bottom of Plaguewood.
Moreover, the place was no longer called Plaguewood. It was now the Fire Cave. And deep within Fire Cave was where the great Fire Throne stood!
This news caused a commotion when it reached back to the town.
It wasn't just the townsfolk who were excited. Even the apprentices training near the town were elated to hear the news.
Several of the apprentices stationed here by their clans hurried to the Fire Cave out of curiosity and visited the Fire Throne.
According to the courtesies of the Continent of Adepts, they had the good fortune to stay over at the tower for one night. Consequently, they managed to talk to the apprentice adepts within the tower. That was where they heard who the tower belonged to. The Fire Throne was the adept's tower of Adept Greem from the Sarubo Clan.
Sarubo Clan? It sounded familiar. They seemed to be an inconspicuous middle-sized clan in the central area of the continent.
Adept Greem? This name was extremely unfamiliar to their ears!
Greem's title as the Flame Demon had only spread in a small area around Feidnan City. Many adept clans just a little further away had never even heard of him.
However, the speed at which news spread through the world of adepts was extremely shocking!
When these apprentices sent news of what they had heard back to their clans, rumors of the Flame Demon quickly proliferated among the adepts.
A newly advanced adept that, against all the odds, had slain a veteran adept while outnumbered. He then went on to kill an elite bloodline adept during a clan war.
All of these rumors attracted the attention of many clans when they were dug up and revealed.
It didn't matter how you looked at it! It seemed to be the triumphant rise of a powerful adept!
Thus, more and more apprentices traveled to Pinecone Town before making their way to that mysterious adept's tower– Fire Throne.
The culture of the Continent of Adepts dictated that most of the tower be open to the public, except for specific important areas. Every adept's tower had certain areas open to the public. These places often provided replenishments for traveling adepts and apprentices, as well as a place to take a short rest.
That was one of the ways by which adept's towers made money!
Of course, the only ones who could enter the tower to rest and stock up on supplies were adepts and apprentices. Ordinary adventurers and mercenaries had to ask for help from acquaintance apprentices if they wanted to purchase enchanted equipment. The prosperity of the tower also indirectly created a social circle of apprentices and adventurers, causing the formation of an external market around the tower.
…………
Billis was a wandering apprentice adept.
He lacked talent and was still a beginner apprentice despite being thirty-five years old. Moreover, he only held a pathetic total of two spells– Probe and Faint Illumination.
The first spell wasn't an unusual divining ability. It was a simple spell used to ascertain whether any food had been poisoned, or the purpose of an unidentified object. The second spell created an area of dim light around the caster and lowered the visibility of the field to disrupt enemies.
Indeed, these two spells were not offensive spells. They weren't even defensive spells. They were only low-level auxiliary spells.
Billis' family was also an ordinary noble family. They couldn't bear Billis' drain on the family's resources when he had nothing to offer in return. Consequently, three years ago, the clan had cut off their provision of resources and money to him. Billis had no choice but to leave the adept's tower he had lived and studied in for twenty-seven years to become a wandering apprentice adept.
Of course, if he were willing to return to his family, there was still a chance he could become a manager of a trading company or a small noble in a rural area. However, Billis had decided to dedicate his life to the work of an adept. He still dreamed of the day he could become a great and respected adept.
He'd rather wander and explore various areas than go home and become a puppet of the family.
He had just happened to hear of this new adept's tower near Pinecone Town when he had been traveling through the Ailovis area. Hoping that this mysterious adept would recruit some foreign apprentices, Billis immediately changed course and hurried toward this rumored Fire Throne.
Pinecone Town had now turned into a lively place. Adventurers with bows on their backs and swords at their hips were everywhere. Mercenaries walked through the streets here a
nd there. Everyone immediately rushed forward to recruit Billis when they saw the short apprentice's robe he wore.
At this moment, Pinecone Town was bustling. It didn't matter how weak of an apprentice you were; you would be welcome anywhere as long as you had a spatial storage belt. After all, the activation and storage of goods in a spatial belt required the exhaustion of Spirit. No regular non-caster class could use the item by themselves. Only apprentice adepts could do so.
That was why adventuring parties had to recruit apprentices if they wanted to haul more goods back with them.
Unfortunately, Billis had other plans and rejected their invitations without hesitation. Billis successfully passed through the hundred and fifty kilometers of the forest after hiring an experienced local guide. He arrived at the entrance of the rumored Fire Cave.
In truth, Billis had already been surprised by the hustle and bustle of the place long before he reached the messy pile of rocks where the Fire Cave was.
Billis had already met several small parties hurrying to Fire Cave even while he was less than ten kilometers away. Their parties varied in size. Some were hunting parties with a dozen members, while others were exploration teams with three to four men. Parties of two individuals like Billis and his guide were non-existent.
The further they went, the more parties they met. They were either dragging large prey behind them or carrying huge blood-soaked bags on their shoulders as they excitedly walked through the Black Forest.
Many parties would yell and greet each other when they crossed paths, asking questions here and there. "How're today's spoils?" "Did you find another hidden den somewhere?" And all sorts of other strange inquiries.
Billis was utterly stunned when he finally made it through the forest and arrived at a vast space.
Here was the Black Forest!
This was a dangerous territory one hundred and fifty kilometers deep in the Black Forest!
Yet, there was a row of crude wooden huts and tents in front of Billis' eyes. There were easily four hundred of these makeshift shelters. Adventurers and mercenaries wearing various costumes casually walked around this temporary camp. One could see people selling beast and animal hides in personal booths everywhere, as well as apprentices in short robes haggling with mercenaries.
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