The message was straightforward. It was an invitation for Greem to join an adept organization known as the Winds of Freedom. The related privileges and duties of joining this organization couldn’t be any simpler. It seemed that he only needed to leave his magical brand on the letter to become a member of this adept organization. He would enjoy access to large amounts of information, resources, and knowledge not available to the outside world.
Meanwhile, the only limitation that the organization placed on Greem was for him to bravely stand out and defend the benefits of all Zhentarim adepts with his power should the Zhentarim area ever come under the invasion of any of the three major forces.
Greem instantly understood the situation from this information. It was probably an adept organization formed by the old men of the Zhentarim Association. The purpose of the organization was to unite the adepts of the central region to resist any invasions from the three major adept organizations.
Greem had not reached the requisite power level before this and, thus, had not been privy to the existence of this organization. Now that he had become a Third Grade, he finally received their invitation.
It could be seen that the threshold for entering the Winds of Freedom was to be Third Grade!
It indirectly demonstrated the massive difference between this organization and other small adept organizations.
Greem hesitated for a moment and finally extended a single finger burning with a bright yellow flame, and pressed it against the invitation letter.
The golden flame instantly left the mark of a burning fist upon the blue letter.
The next second, the blue elementium particles scattered into a sky full of glowing lights and leaving behind a strange palm-sized mirror on the spot.
Greem took the mirror in his hands as a notification immediately rang from the Chip in his mind.
[Beep. Detecting strange Spirit port. Initial appraisal suggests it to be a Spirit network port. Results of data scans: Safe.]
A Spirit network port?
Greem paused for a moment but abruptly understood something.
He had always been curious about something all this time. The state of civilization in the World of Adepts had always appeared to be too primitive and inferior. Regardless of how you looked at it, the World of Adepts was one of the powerful spellcasting factions of the multiverse. Their origin homeland should not be this backward.
Yet, the appearance of this round mirror fully demonstrated that Greem had not truly entered the civilization of the adepts. His past self had always been a lone wolf in the wilderness, wandering outside the periphery of the adept civilization.
Without any hesitation, Greem thrust his Spirit into the round mirror.
The next second, he found himself in a sea of information as the massive amount of data instantly flooded him.
If Greem had been alone, he would probably be moaning in agony at this moment.
Fortunately, with the aid of the Chip, any amount of data would not be able to run down Greem’s mental consciousness.
Greem had been sitting in his secret room. Now, he felt as if he had entered a strange Spirit world, turning into some sort of pure mental consciousness body within this realm.
After just three seconds, Greem got used to this body of consciousness, and he tried to open his eyes.
“Welcome to the Winds of Freedom. Is there anything I can do for you?”
The first to appear in front of Greem was a young, pretty girl in a fancy dress. She smiled sweetly at Greem and bowed in respect.
Greem looked around in confusion and then looked down at himself.
This place was a special stone room, only ten square meters in size. There were no decorations, furniture, doors, or windows; it was simply Greem and the girl standing in the room.
Greem extended his hands and put them in front of himself.
As expected, he didn’t see his original hands, but a cluster of strange shimmering light. This world and this girl in front of him didn’t exist in reality either. They were only illusions simulated through the use of magic.
Chapter 861 - Trading Hall
“Where is this?” Greem finally couldn’t help but ask this question.
“Sir, this is the entrance to the Winds of Freedom’s Spirit Illusion Realm. You can find any resource, information, or magical knowledge you need here.” The beautiful girl explained with a smile on her face.
“Then tell me about the basic situation of this Spirit Illusion Realm!” Greem ordered without any reservations.
He could clearly see that, despite being extremely life-like, this beautiful girl didn’t actually exist and was no more than a light-projection simulated with the use of magic. As for whether there was actually a young girl controlling this ‘body’ behind the scenes or an old adept full of wrinkles on his face, Greem had no idea whatsoever.
That was why he paid no heed to the girl’s flattering and instead turned his attention toward this fascinating Illusion Realm.
“Don’t worry, sir. All your personal information and behavior within the Spirit Illusion Realm will be securely protected. Apart from a few authorities of the organizations, no one can see any of your information.”
“You are currently at the entrance of this Spirit Illusion Realm. There are seven stone doors before you, each one leading to a different area. Door One leads to the Trading Hall. You can purchase and sell all sorts of resources and magical items there. Moreover, the resources traded in the hall will not be limited to just those from the World of Adepts.”
As the girl started her introduction, three strange stone doors suddenly appeared on the stone wall in front. They were marked with the numbers one, two, and three in the symbology of the adepts.
“Door Two leads to the Knowledge Hall. There, you will find most magical knowledge and subjects available in the World of Adepts.”
“Door Three leads to the Mission Hall. You can find suitable companions there to accompany you on explorations of mysterious and foreign worlds.”
“As you have only just joined the Winds of Freedom, you only possess the lowest level of security access. You may only visit these three areas. The other areas will only be available once you have accumulated sufficient contribution points.”
With his knowledge from Earth in his past life, Greem quickly grasped the functions and purpose of this Spirit Illusion Realm without much trouble. In fact, Greem’s illusion body started to shift under the control of his Spirit consciousness. Soon, he had managed to replicate his real appearance in the Illusion Realm.
However, for the sake of hiding his identity, he created a mask of fire and hid his face.
It was best to go to Hall One first. It might be possible to indirectly understand the strength of the Winds of Freedom through the wealth of resources there!
Greem’s spirit consciousness body crashed into Door One and instantly passed through.
There was a long, winding stone corridor behind the door, with countless stone doors along the corridor. Adepts continuously emerged from the stone doors and walked down the hall toward someplace.
Greem took a look around him and turned back to touch the stone wall. It was hard and solid, while the surface was rough and cold; it felt just like a stone wall in reality. It could be seen how terrifying the ability of the adept who created this Spirit Illusion Realm was!
“Chip, can you analyze everything here?”
[Beep. Host’s instructions cannot be completed. A complete system of planar laws protects this place. Any hostile probes will trigger the corresponding law powers.]
The power of laws!
Greem brooded for a moment and finally gave up on the idea of looking into the secrets of this place. He followed the corridor and walked into the distance.
After several hundreds of meters, he arrived at the exit.
A massive underground stone hall appeared in front of his eyes when he stepped out of the corridor. Thick stone pillars were everywhere, and several adepts
could be seen close to every single pillar. These adepts had their hands against the columns and were seemingly communicating with someone or something.
The entire hall was utterly silent, and all the adepts were busy with their own business. The place was void of the usual liveliness and bustling noise of a market.
Greem hesitated for a moment before walking to a stone pillar. He pressed his hand against it, and a series of fast-moving pieces of information were projected into his mind.
Looking For: Dragon-related Healing Essence. Price will be negotiated in person.
Selling: Black Prince’s Eye. Possesses the ability to absorb spirit bodies. 2,000 magical crystals.
Selling: Undying Intelligence Potion Tablet (Fragment). 17,000 magical crystals.
Selling: Azure Blue Magical Thread.Excellent quality. 9,000 magical crystals.
Looking For: Undying Soul, Third Grade. Price will be negotiated in person.
Trading: 100 grams of Dragonscale Flower in exchange for 300 kilograms of Bloodstone.
Selling: 50 grams of Origin Ore. 1.5 million magical crystals.
……
……
Row after row and line after line of trade requests rolled through Greem’s mind. He had not even heard of the names of most of these items, let alone their functions and value.
Compared to the goblin shops that Snorlax had set up across the continent, the items and resources here were what truly suited high-grade adepts.
Greem performed a simple search and even found Essences of Fire in the list of items.
Looking For: 5 Essences of Fire. Can exchange with magical crystals or Chaos Gems.
What were chaos gems?
Greem was still confused, but the Chip had already found the related data on them.
Chaos gems were a sort of magical gem only found in outer space. They possessed a trace of chaos energy. When used on certain items, they had a percentage chance of changing the magical traits and attributes of those items. Of course, they were more likely to destroy the object instead.
They were a bizarre artifact with a very strange use!
Greem still had some Essences of Fire on hand, but he only had three of them; it wasn’t enough to fulfill the requirements of the purchase request. Moreover, those chaos gems didn’t seem to hold any purpose for Greem.
Thus, Greem quickly gave up on the trade after browsing through it.
Greem thought for a moment. Over the past few years, the Goblin Plane and Lance had been steadily providing the Crimson Clan with large amounts of resources. These two planes had already become the foundations with which the Crimson Clan rose to power. Thus, what they most lacked currently was not magical crystals, but a sort of special alloy known as Queyras Alloy.
The metal known as Queyras was currently the only magical alloy suited for constructing space furnaces and magic generator furnaces. Other magical alloys might be better than Queyras alloy in terms of physical durability or elementium resistance, but they couldn’t handle the wild corrosion of space energy.
After constructing a small magic generator furnace for Split-Off Brain Gru awhile ago, Greem only had enough Queyras alloy left on hand for a single space furnace.
That was why Greem had recently been pushing Snorlax to search and gather for all information related to Queyras alloy in the World of Adepts. Unfortunately, he found nothing at all!
Greem had always been somewhat resentful of Snorlax because of this, believing that he had not been careful and thorough enough in his work. Now, it seemed as if it wasn’t the fault of the little goblin. Instead, such Queyras alloy was a high-grade resource to begin with. It was not something that someone of Snorlax’s level could come into contact with.
Now that he had the opportunity, Greem silently started to search for all product information related to Queyras.
As expected, three trade requests instantly appeared before his eyes.
Looking For: 1000 kilograms of Queyras Alloy. Price will be negotiated in person.
Trading: 300 tons of Queyras metal ores in exchange for one Frost Origin Substance.
Trading: 3000 kilograms of Queyras Alloy for 1 Lich Phylactery.
Greem looked at the three lines of information before him, and the muscles in his face started to twitch.
The first one was the same as him– a request to purchase Queyras alloy. He could ignore that one.
The other two clearly held a Queyras ore vein in their hands, but the items they wanted to trade it for made Greem’s scalp buzz at the very sight of them.
Frost Origin Substance. Anything that had the word ‘origin’ attached to it would cost a hundred times more than any product on the market.
Origin Substances were physical manifestations of certain law powers.
Laws were undoubtedly the most potent force within planar worlds. However, this power was intangible and invisible. There was no point at which to research or study it. One could only slowly understand the laws through their personal mastery of magic.
However, in specific environments and locations, the powers of the laws could combine with certain substances in a planar world, giving birth to precious origin substances.
The second request asked for Frost Origin Substance. That had to be a mysterious substance manifested from the concentration of ice laws. Adepts who were in a rush to understand ice laws would undoubtedly improve tremendously if they were to obtain a Frost Origin Substance.
However, such Frost Origin Substances were, without a doubt, Fourth Grade items. A Third Grade adept like Greem would not have a slim chance to even come into contact with them.
Meanwhile, the lich phylactery mentioned in the third request was also a Fourth Grade artifact.
Possessing a lich phylactery was like gaining control over an obedient Fourth Grade lich. That alone was more than enough to demonstrated the worth of Queyras alloy!
Greem sighed and gave up on his plans to purchase Queyras alloy here.
It seemed he would have to look for related mine information in other planar worlds if he wanted to obtain a large amount of Queyras metal. If he possessed a Queyras mine in his hands, he would be able to instantly put the massive metal resources of the Goblin Plane to use.
It wouldn’t be until he possessed a large amount of Queyras alloy and could forge magic generator furnaces of sufficient size and number that he could bring the metallic creations on the blueprints to life. These were things like the Sky Patrol Ship, the Goblin Golem Dragon, the Dimensional Ripper, and the Thunder God Titan.
Before this, Greem could only dream of the power of these metallic creations.
After gaining a simple understanding of the Trading Hall’s functions, Greem patted his body and cut off the connection between his mental consciousness and this Spirit body.
The next second, he opened his eyes, and his consciousness had returned to the secret room in Fire Throne.
Greem closed his eyes for a moment and found nothing wrong with his condition.
The self-examination of the Chip yielded the same result.
It seemed like the Spirit Illusion Realm was a significant location for high-grade adepts to gather and interact. Meanwhile, the fact that the Winds of Freedom could put together so many high-grade adepts was evidence of its accumulated power and background.
Truly, who knew how many Fourth Grade monsters stood silently behind the Winds of Freedom?
Greem thought to himself.
Chapter Notes:
For those who would like to kick in a couple of bucks and aren’t looking for advance chapters, we also have a Ko-Fi for one time donations and support. It doesn’t see much use (hell, if you have a few bucks, you might as well be a Patron and get a few extra chapters ahead), but people still occasionally help us through that, and every bit of support helps.
As always, more than anything, thank you everyone for your continued readership and support of Age of Adepts!
-Ryu
Chapter 862 - Knowledge and Mission<
br />
Much like the Trading Hall, the Knowledge Hall behind Door Two and the Mission Hall behind Door Three were filled with high-grade adepts from all over Zhentarim.
Some of them had concealed their figure and appearance, while others didn’t bother with the effort.
Greem probed around a little with his Spirit and was surprised to find that most adepts moving around the Spirit Illusion Realm were Second Grade adepts. That couldn’t help but make him extremely confused!
After asking the girl acting as his guide, Greem discovered that the lowest threshold to join the Winds of Freedom wasn’t Third Grade, but Second Grade. As for why Greem only received the invitation after he reached Third Grade? That most likely involved interference from some individuals within the organization.
That also meant that some people had mobilized their authority and resources to deny the Winds of Freedom’s invitation to Greem when he was Second Grade. It wasn’t until Greem had advanced to Third Grade, and that individual’s authority was no longer enough to maintain such an operation, that Greem had been invited.
In all honesty, before he joined the Winds of Freedom, Greem had truly been a little complacent about the influence and resources he held in his hands. He believed his power and resources were comparable even amongst adepts of his same grade. However, this little bit of complacency was smashed to bits in the Trading Hall and Knowledge Hall. He once again recognized the wealth and breadth of resources that these veteran adepts had accumulated over hundreds of years. It was not something that a rookie like himself could hope to match.
The shelves upon shelves of magical knowledge in the Knowledge Hall encompassed almost every single aspect of the system of laws in the World of Adepts. Unfortunately, with his newcomer’s authority, Greem could only browse magical knowledge as high as the Second Grade.
He would first have to increase his contribution points before he could even think of looking at Third Grade content!
If Greem could produce a set of First Grade information not recorded in the organization’s data library, he would obtain a hundred contribution points. For Second Grade knowledge he would earn a thousand points. Third Grade, ten thousand points.
Age of Adepts c1-1513 Page 532