Age of Adepts c1-1513

by Zhen De Lao Lang, 真的老狼

  Now that all this finished, Little Locke smashed the button on his belt, and a dome-shaped protective forcefield enveloped him.

  The Invincible Belt was a magical energy item that Little Locke had invented himself. It could erect a dome-shaped defensive forcefield with energy supplied from magical energy batteries. As it did not require any magical input from Locke himself, he could turn his attention to other things.

  Dong! A muffled boom rang out.

  The lunging Lens ran into the semi-translucent forcefield and was instantly stunned by the impact. Yet, before he could beat his wings and escape, the three revolving metal eyeballs appeared to have received instructions and locked onto Lens’ bat form. Three red heat rays shot toward him from different angles.

  Forty points.

  Lens’ rich personal experience allowed him to judge the energy intensity of the heat rays before they reached him. Though forty points of damage wasn’t too intense, they would have no problem piercing through the body of a transformed bat.

  Supposedly, the blood elves would turn into their human forms once they had closed the distance between them and their enemies, using their rapid attacks to circle the enemy. However, this time, the barrage of energy beams forced Lens to dodge and run. He couldn’t find any chance to attack Locke’s defensive forcefield.

  Just as the bat wildly dodged about, the crude machine on the ground creaked and charged at him as well.

  Pu!

  The first gift from the machine was a swirling pillar of fire. Strange alchemical powder shot out of the machine’s skinny arms, which turned into searing alchemical flames when they came into contact with the air, burning the bat as it gave chase.

  The faces of the blood elves around the arena turned dark.

  Dammit! Why were the tricks of this goblin so nasty?

  Fortunately, Lens was a smart and sharp guy as well. He quickly erected a layer of blood mist to protect himself.

  He then flapped his wings with all he had and rushed out of the area covered by the flames. The moment he escaped from the flames, three sizzling heat rays shot toward him.

  Lens screamed and started maneuvering. It took him a lot of effort to dodge two of the beams, and the last remaining one pierced through his right wing to leave a small, scorched hole on its edge.

  Dammit! I had best deal with these three annoying metal balls first!

  The thought ran through his mind, and Lens couldn’t be bothered with the little goblin for now. Instead, he turned abruptly and targeted one of the metal eyeballs.

  As if it had sensed Lens’ intent, this metal eyeball stopped attacking and started to move through the air like an agile bird, making unpredictable movements all over the place. Lens’ flight speed might have been swifter than the metal eyeball, but it wasn’t that easy to catch the machine when it was focused purely on escaping. That was particularly the case given how large the plaza was.

  Moreover, the two metal eyeballs were still sticking behind him like pieces of gum, continuously shooting off their attacks. However, these two sly eyeballs weren’t getting too close to Lens either. They would instantly switch their roles of bait or hunting dog at any moment if they discovered Lens intended to change targets.

  For a moment, these three eyeballs dragged Lens along the ride like a dog taken for a walk. There was nothing the vampire could do at all.

  Naturally, the golem machine could not fly and couldn’t participate in the battle happening in the skies. However, under Little Locke’s command, the machine stopped and proceeded to transform. Spikes emerged from its large metal feet and fixed it on the spot as its metal back opened to reveal a trove of goblin rockets.

  “Locke Improved Rocket Launcher Number Three.”

  Little Locke shouted loudly. Boom! Boom! Boom! A series of goblin rockets launched into the sky, propelled by orange alchemical flames at their tails.

  Lens, who was still being tortured by the three metal eyeballs, felt a chill run down his spine. It was only now that he saw the seven rockets rapidly whistling toward him.

  He shrieked and turned to charge downward. He dodged in the air above the town, but the seven rockets were still pursuing him closely while their blazing trails left a beautiful picture in the night sky.

  Lens no longer cared for his reputation now; he just wanted to get away. The vampire dove into the crowd and started to weave between the legs of the hunters and apprentices in his bat form. The group was instantly thrown into chaos as they ran in every direction to avoid the goblin rockets.

  Little Locke sighed and sent out an invisible order with the thought-amplifying device on his head. The seven rockets suddenly switched directions, rushing up into the air before exploding into blooming fireworks three hundred meters high in the night sky.

  The onlooking apprentices started cursing. They were clearly upset with Lens’ despicable and unsavory actions.

  Seria looked at the crowd coldly as she stood at the edge of the plaza, and the voices in the darkness quickly went silent.

  Lens took advantage of Little Locke’s diverted attention towards the careful manipulation of his rockets to revert to his human form and lunged at the goblin.

  Zeng, zeng, zeng!

  For a moment, Lens utilized his rapid movements to their fullest potential, circling Little Locke’s protective forcefield and leaving crimson claw marks on it.

  These melee attacks might not be all that powerful, but the blood energy in them possessed a terrifying corrosion effect. Thick red smoke rose from the forcefield as it sizzled. A thick layer of the shield had been shaved away by the corrosion.

  Little Locke felt cold sweat run down his body at this attack. He quickly gave the command, and the three eyeballs returned to use their heat rays once again to force Lens away. The golem machine also straightened its body and rushed to Little Locke’s side to watch his back.

  Lens found an opportunity to forcefully break through the screen of heat rays while Little Locke was in a panic. He successfully destroyed one of the eyeballs, but he paid the price of having his shoulders pierced by two heat rays to accomplish this.

  If this wasn’t a duel, Lens could have dived into the forest and used his bloodsucking regenerative abilities to heal his wounds. Unfortunately, there were no ‘blood treats’ for him on this battlefield.

  He had not managed to deal any visible damage to Little Locke up till now. As such, there was no chance for him to recover any damage. On the other hand, the eyeball machines and the golem had no flesh or blood that he could feast upon.

  The blood elves watching couldn’t help but frown, and their hatred for the goblin magical mechanics deepened once more. It was truly an anti-human profession.

  Perhaps because the wounds on his body caused Lens to go berserk, but he actually managed to use his speed and agility to destroy the two remaining eyeballs after gritting his teeth and chasing after them.

  Without the harassment of the eyeballs, the clumsy golem had no way of keeping up with the blood elf’s phantasmal movements. Lens once again left the machine behind him and left a bloody mark on Little Locke’s forecfield.

  Finally, after repeated attacks, the forcefield dispersed, exposing the goblin within.

  If this was a battle in the woods, Locke could have retreated by relying on his teammate’s cover to erect a new forcefield after swapping out a new battery for the belt. Unfortunately, he had no such opportunity in a duel like this.

  Lens took advantage of this great opportunity and lunged forward furiously.

  He even sacrificed his left arm to the chainsaw attack of the golem just to get past. However, once he made it past the golem, there was no longer anything standing between him and the goblin.

  “You damned little thing. Go and die.”

  After an entire night of humiliation, Lens roared and rushed at Locke.

  Just as Lens prepared to murder Locke in a single strike, the goblin took out a small and delicate energy beam gun.

  “Haha, even t
he most powerful heat ray can’t help you now.”

  Sadly, before Lens could even finish speaking, a sky-blue beam of energy shot out from the gun.

  It’s blue?

  Lens’ hadn’t finished the thought when his body had already become enveloped in a layer of blue ice. The coldness of this ice was beyond that of ice in the natural world. It froze not only Lens’ body, but also his mind as well.

  Little Locke leaped a hundred meters away with his rocket boots, stumbled, and stabilized himself.

  Behind him, the frozen Lens behaved like a clumsy boar. His body flew across the plaza and smashed into a crude wooden house.

  Screams and the sound of tumbling tables and chairs rang out from the house.

  Frost Ray Gun!

  Little Locke spun the gun about his finger brazenly and blew away the non-existent smoke from its barrel. He then casually put the gun back on his belt.

  A row of five guns of different colors rested there, each of them seemingly corresponding to an energy ray of a different elementium.

  The wild cheers of many goblin apprentices immediately rang out from the crowd.

  Chapter 799 - Arm's Request

  After a long time spent on repairs, the badly ravaged Fire Throne finally had regained its luster.

  A small portal slowly opened on the fire altar in a magical room on the fifth floor, and two fire creatures of different shapes appeared.

  Due to the existence of the tower’s defensive system, several coils of energy chains extended from the walls the moment the creatures appeared. They wrapped around the fire creature on the left and lashed at the one on the right.

  “Back off!”

  As the shout rang out throughout the room, the defensive systems shut down, and the energy chains that had extended to the flaming tiger vanished without a trace.

  The blazing shroud of fire dispersed, revealing Greem’s young, handsome face beneath. The red elementium flames quickly turned into a red adept’s robe and fell upon his broad and muscular body.

  “Lord Cindral, welcome to my tower. Do you intend to leave at once, or do you wish to find a place to rest first?”

  Greem was once again in his tower. He could sense the diverse energy spectrum and magical runes about him. That indescribable sense of power caused him to no longer fear the threat of the Third Grade flaming tiger.

  One couldn’t think too much of Cindral’s might just because of his display of power in the Fire Elementium Plane. Here in the World of Adepts, suppressed by the world consciousness, he would not be able to square off against the owner of an adept’s tower. Also, both of them had signed a friendly contract that forbade mutual aggression and violence.

  However, the methods of adepts were strange and unpredictable. Cindral couldn’t be sure that Greem didn’t have any unique means by which to work around the contract and set out a deadly trap for himself. As such, the tiger shook his head when he heard Greem’s question and said, “I still have some matters to attend to. You just need to use your authority over the tower to send me into the lava sea.”

  “If that is the case, then I won’t ask Lord Cindral to stay any longer. Please…”

  Not much longer after the first portal on the fire altar had closed, a new portal slowly opened under Greem’s control. One could vaguely sense the overwhelming fire energy on the other side of the door of light, and the rumbling sound of surging lava echoed throughout the room.

  Cindral sensed with his Spirit and confirmed that it was an open sea of lava on the other end. He chose not to dally any longer and immediately leaped into the lava, disappearing without a trace.

  Once the portal had closed, Greem considered for a moment and shut his eyes to sense everything within the tower.

  It seemed the tower had received severe damage sometime earlier. Several of the lower floors were detached from the control of the defensive system, and plenty of energy dead spots had appeared on the defense network of the tower walls. That meant the energy nodes within the tower walls had been damaged. They couldn’t be restored to their previously integrated state without extensive overhauls and repairs.

  Greem’s spiritual appendages were like tentacles and freely extended throughout the tower’s structure and along the energy network. He silently assessed the damage left behind after the last battle.

  Apart from the damage to the tower itself, Greem also sensed the minds of several dozen adepts within the tower. The soul aura of these adepts was unfamiliar and foreign, but without exception, all of their soul brands had been left in the central control crystal of the tower.

  Naturally, as the owner of the tower, Greem possessed the highest authority!

  He quickly read through the records of everything that had happened in the tower, including the brutal battles that had ensued around Fire Throne. Soon, he figured out the origins of these foreign adepts.

  To think they were adept prisoners that had chosen to serve the Crimson Clan to work off their crimes!

  Greem also found several magical messages from Lance and the Goblin Plane in the control crystal. In particular, the number of magical messages from Lance reached the hundreds. It seemed Gazlowe was in a hurry to talk with him.

  Greem hesitated for a moment before contacting Gazlowe in Lance through the crystal.

  Who knew that the moment the connection went through, another familiar soul flux butted in.

  “Greem. Greem, you finally came back! Hurry up and help me! As long as you can help me get Iritina back, I’ll be willing to establish a companionship contract with you.”

  It was Thunder Dragon Arms!

  The so-called companionship contract was just a more elegant name for a dragon enslavement contract.

  Once a dragon signed a contract like this with another individual, it would no longer be able to reject requests for aid in battle. Still, as a companion, the other party couldn’t force it to fight excessively powerful enemies. In most material planes, the intelligent races could only become the proud dragon knights by establishing companionship contracts with dragons!

  The fact that a Third Grade thunder dragon was willing to surrender part of his freedom meant that the situation was fairly severe.

  As such, Greem didn’t agree to Arms’ request on impulse and instead started to draw out all the details from Arms’ mouth.

  As expected, the reason Arms was willing to become Greem’s contracted dragon was to have Greem help him deal with a powerful Fourth Grade dragon– Wing of the Azure Sky, Krille.

  Arms had indeed led an idyllic-like life after tricking the emerald and green dragons to follow him back to Lance. Unfortunately, the prideful Iritina was not a dragon that could be restrained to a tiny Third Grade dragon’s territory.

  She led the green dragons on conquests everywhere, taking over the territories of three Second Grade dragon-lords in a row. However, one of those dragons was a direct subordinate to Fourth Grade Krille.

  Just as expected, the reckless behavior of Iritina and the other dragons drew the powerful Fourth Grade dragon upon them.

  However, what no dragon had expected was for Wings of the Azure Sky Krille to be attracted to Iritina’s shocking beauty the moment he met her. After a bit of fighting around and getting to know each other, Krille successfully captured Iritina’s heart, and the two dragons got together to move into the same place.

  Once Arms realized the situation, he hurried over, only to be beaten up by Krille.

  Naturally, he was not the opponent of a Fourth Grade dragon with his power. He could only swallow this humiliating and bitter pill. In the end, he made his decision and came here searching for help from Greem.

  In all honesty, if it weren’t for this lack of options and his inability to find another helper to deal with a Fourth Grade dragon, he would never have extended the offer to an adept.

  Forming a companionship contract with an adept meant that it was very likely that he would lose his most precious freedom!

  Third Grade Arms had still bee
n wondering if this decision of his was worth it. However, now that he sensed Greem’s hesitation in his mental flux while listening to the request, Arms couldn’t help but feel anxious once again, concerned that the adept would reject the offer.

  After all, agreeing to his offer meant engaging in direct conflict with a Fourth Grade dragon!

  Even Fourth Grade adepts would have to think over such a matter repeatedly before making a decision.

  Just as Greem was silent and frowning in thought, a hidden mental message rang out in his mind.

  “Agree to his offer! I can help you think of something to deal with the Fourth Grade dragon!”

  It was Alice’s voice.

  Greem instantly calmed down with Alice’s assurance. He pretended to hesitate for a bit longer and then feigned reluctance as he agreed.

  Arms couldn’t help but let out a long roar when he heard this mysterious adept agree to his request.

  “That is it then. If you help me beat that Krille and take back Iritina, I will immediately sign a companionship contract with you.”

  Greem let out a cold snort, “I will do my best when it comes to defeating Krille, but I can’t make any promises when it comes to taking back Iritina.”

  “That will work too. I swear in the name of the Dragon God, if you chase away Krille from Iritina’s side, I will immediately sign a companionship contract with you without hesitation!” The furious Arms cut his finger immediately and swore with immense binding power using an origin contract.

  “Then wait for my news! I will arrange for this matter as fast as I can.”

  After consoling Arms, Greem cut off the connection with Lance and silently contacted Alice, far away in the Tower of Fate.

  Alice appeared to have been waiting for him for some time. Their mental fluctuations almost instantly connected with Fire Throne as the medium.

  “Alice, do you actually have the confidence to deal with a Fourth Grade dragon?” Greem couldn’t help but ask doubtfully.