Age of Adepts c1-1513

by Zhen De Lao Lang, 真的老狼

  Gazlowe remained silent throughout, seemingly assenting to Gru’s suggestion.

  Greem couldn’t help but narrow his eyes.

  “Give you two magic generator furnaces, you keep one for yourself and use the other to create a Mothership for me? Is that what you mean?”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “Hehehe, this proposition sounds good. But those little goblins seem to be able to do this as well. Moreover, if I gave them two magic generator furnaces, they would be able to provide me with two Sky Patrol Motherships!”

  Gru’s squid-like brain subtly communicated with his main self.

  Without any hesitation, Gru increased his offer.

  “Two magic generators, we provide you with a Mothership along with a three-hundred strong magical machine army, all of them high-quality advanced First Grade fighters.”

  “I provide you with three magic generator furnaces, you make me two Motherships and give me five hundred magical machines.”

  “This…”

  “Moreover, the Mothership you make for yourself will have to be beholden to orders when the clan requires its service. Of course, if any damages were to happen to the ship, the clan will reimburse you and compensate for the losses!”

  Gru silently discussed with this main body for quite a while before ‘reluctantly’ agreeing.

  In truth, this was only a strategy of the brain monster!

  It sounded as if this deal would force the brain monster to pay a considerable sum. However, at its core, it did not hurt any of Gazlowe’s real benefits. What did he lose in creating Motherships and magical machines for Greem?

  Just some magical alloy and time!

  He could make up for the magical alloy by finding metal veins in Lance to mine. The factories and magical energy used to create the machines all belonged to himself. With enough time and effort, he could produce as much magical alloy as he wanted.

  That was why Gazlowe believed the deal to be worthwhile, even if Greem’s conditions appeared to be extremely ‘strict.’

  “Then, my lord, how many magic generator furnaces do you intend to provide us with initially?” Gru finally couldn’t suppress the urge to prove at Greem’s bottom line.

  “Let’s proceed with six magic generator furnaces! When you show me four Motherships, I will hand over the six magic generator furnaces.”

  Gru couldn’t help but be overjoyed.

  Six Motherships; this was no big problem for the Capital of Eternity. It would take them a month at best to successfully create all of them. However, that would be straining the metal reserves of the city.

  It seemed like they had to increase the number of mine scouting parties on the outside to find all available metal veins near the city.

  Both parties quickly reached an agreement, one that satisfied and pleased them both!

  Greem did not stay in the Capital for much longer. Instead, he returned to the teleportation array and went back to the World of Adepts.

  …………

  World of Adepts, Tower of Fate.

  When the blinding white light of the array faded, Greem saw Alice, who was waiting there to greet him.

  Berserk Witch Sofia and a newly advanced Fate Witch followed behind her.

  Her face looked even paler than the last time he had seen her, but her mental condition didn’t seem too bad.

  “How are you? I heard you exhausted quite a lot of Fate power during this war. You didn’t damage your soul origin, did you?” Greem strode out of the array and held Alice by her waist.

  Even though they had already consummated their relationship, Alice was still not used to Greem’s public displays of affection. Her face blushed when she felt Greem’s warm and large hand wrap around her waist. She glanced at him angrily but did not push away the hand.

  “It’s been a few days since our victory and you only just came after I called for you so many times. Hmph! It seems I have no place in your heart.” Alice couldn’t help but complain.

  “Don’t change the topic of conversation. Tell me, how much Fate power did you lose during this war?” Greem once again asked softly.

  Alice couldn’t help but let out a sigh, “We Fate Witches do not have much combat power to speak of; all we can rely upon is the blessing of Fate. Thank the stars that we won in the end. Otherwise, I would have suffered a huge loss!”

  Chapter 896 - Doverand Basin

  Alice might have beaten Morgana, but in the end, it was a narrow victory!

  Morgana had lost the reputation of the Coldwinter Witches and one-third of the clan’s resource sites, while Alice lost all the Fate power she had so painstakingly accumulated over the years.

  It was important to note that this was the capital that Alice had only managed to accumulate after participating in three planar wars!

  Still, the Fate Witches had obtained a massive opportunity due to this war. Their overall strength was now skyrocketing.

  At the moment, there were as many as seven Fate Witches in the Tower of Fate. Though it was not yet at the level before their invasion into Faen, the average quality of the witches was higher.

  Moreover, with the gradual increase of their territory, the Fate Witches were receiving more and more apprentice seeds from all over the land. The seven Fate Witches ran all over their territory, day and night, selecting talented individuals from amongst these apprentice seeds and taking them back to the Tower of Fate.

  Those with inferior talent were then placed in nearby resource sites for study and further training.

  For the first time in the hundred years since their revival, the number of witch apprentices gathered in the Tower of Fate exceeded a hundred individuals. That was a spectacular event that has never before happened in the history of the Fate Witches!

  A hundred witch apprentices would only be too few apprentices in any other witch branch, never too many. However, it was different for the Fate Witches.

  As everyone knew, Fate Witches were not known for their combat power. They had almost no professional skills related to combat at the lower grades. Only those like Alice, who had endured until they were Second Grade, would have chances to shine on the battlefield after mastering skills related to blessing and cursing an opponent’s fate.

  Before this happened, most Fate Witches could only rely on instant-cast magic wands and scrolls to protect themselves. It indirectly increased the difficulty of their survival on the battlefield. That was why it was said that Fate Witches mainly needed the protection of a third party before they were fully developed.

  These lethal ‘weaknesses’ caused the witch apprentices of the Fate branch to be far less numerous than the other branches. Meanwhile, the only ones who could form a codependent relationship with the Fate branch were probably the False Witches, who had strict talent prerequisites and a tremendous difficulty advancing.

  It was said that the essential requirement that False Witches set when selecting apprentices was being female, having no immediate relative, and awakening a talent for illusion before the age of eight.

  These prerequisites alone shut out most candidates, let alone the problematic advancements to come. That was why the False Witches mostly ran a single-student system. That was to say that every False Witch would only take a single student throughout their entire lives.

  That also caused the legacy of the False Witches to easily be cut off due to unexpected incidents!

  In all honesty, if the Northern Witch branches were to be ranked by how weak they were and how few members they had, the False Witches would most definitely sit at the top.

  Quickly followed by the Fate Witches, of course.

  If Alice had not met Greem, the shallow roots of her clan would not have allowed her to survive that painful First Grade journey. Now, with the in-depth cooperation of the Fate Witches and the Crimson Clan, the Fate Witches were well protected by magical machines and elementium golems. They were no longer as frail and weak as they were before.

  The development of the Fate branch fi
nally started to accelerate under such circumstances!

  After staying with Alice at the Tower of Fate for two days, Greem hurried to White Tower after receiving multiple urgent messages from Adept Meryl.

  White Tower had turned into a lively place these days.

  After five years of colonization, the Crimson Clan’s influence had reached a hundred and fifty kilometers deep into the Black Forest. This action undoubtedly touched upon the nerves of many powerful magical creatures. As such, a well-expected stampede had erupted!

  This magical tide of monsters that sprung from the depths of the Black Forest was both an opportunity as well as a trial for the Crimson Clan. If they resisted this stampede, they would gain control of all the rich land and forest around them. If they failed, everything would return to zero. The efforts and resources the clan had invested over the past five years would go to waste, utterly in vain.

  In the face of such immense pressure, Meryl immediately started summoning powerful adepts within the clan to the frontlines to stave off the enemy. Apparently, Zacha and Tigule had already arrived and were fighting with the magical creature lords of Black Forest.

  Meanwhile, the champion of the clan, Bloody Queen Mary, was very close to advancing to Third Grade. As such, she was hiding within Fire Throne, waiting for the time to come. However, her powerful servants were all present on the battlefield, propping up a sturdy defense for the clan.

  The other powerful adept, Bug Adept Billis, was off exploring some ancient ruins in the Central Region. He was temporarily out of contact.

  Consequently, Meryl was still worried about the frontlines. She could not sleep well and had no choice but to repeatedly urge Greem, the clan leader, to hurry to White Tower. Greem could only reluctantly leave the Tower of Fate and teleport to White Tower.

  …………

  Doverand Basin.

  It was a vast basin with fire red cockscomb growing all over the place. The geography was high in the west and low in the east. Overall, the basin was shaped like an oval.

  It was the widest place in the vast Black Forest and, naturally, became the most intense battlefield between the Crimson Clan and the stampede of magical creatures.

  A sturdy fort had been built with Doverand Basin at the center. A large group of Crimson adepts and apprentices led civilians in the defense here, sticking a tough nail into the wing of the beast stampede. Though quite a few beasts and magical creatures had scurried to White Tower, the magical creature lords with the most power and influence were pacing outside the fort.

  Even the magical creature lords didn’t dare to step into the area covered by the White Tower before these human adepts on the outside had all been exterminated.

  The battle continued.

  On the highest spot of Doverand Basin, on the west side, the Crimson adepts were organizing civilians and goblins to build an extremely strong wooden fort.

  The forest and bushes around them had been cleared. Thick and sturdy logs had been sharpened and beaten into the dirt, forming a strong wall around them. Two meters off the ground upon the walls, a series of shooting ports had been carved into the wood. Magic energy rifles gleaming with the shine of metal extended from these ports.

  The one thousand White Tower civilians and goblins inside the fort all had a magic energy rifle of their own. They even had a short pistol at their waists.

  The rifle fired weak versions of Scalding Rays, powered by magic energy batteries. They had a range of a hundred and twenty meters and an offensive power of eleven points. Ordinary beasts had no such thing as magic resistance. The Scalding Rays would leave a clean hole on their bodies with no chance for them to defend. Such attacks would wound magical creatures if they were anything below First Grade.

  The pistols at their waists were primitive goblin guns. They relied on metal bullets fired through alchemical gunpowder to hurt the enemy. It had a range of ten to forty meters and an offensive power of eight points. Each goblin gun might be weak, but when fired in a barrage, they could even wound a FIrst Grade magical creature.

  One could reasonably claim that the ordinary civilians and goblins of the Crimson Clan would not have been able to fight against the magical creatures and beasts had it not been for the clan’s promotion of magic energy rifles and goblin guns. However, with these simple weapons, any fellow that could press a trigger was a magical creature hunter. They could hide behind the sturdy walls and easily slaughter the swarm of beasts coming at them.

  When the horde of wild beasts and birds of prey swarmed out from the east of Black Forest and charged toward the forest across the uneven basin, red dots of light lit up upon the walls. Sizzling beams cut across the sky, landing where the beasts were most concentrated.

  It didn’t matter whether they were thick and fat razor boars, fleet-footed berserk apes, or lithe and agile jaguars– none of them had an easy time crossing the midpoints of the basin.

  The Scalding Rays were like the eyes of the reaper, bringing death with them wherever they went. One beast after another howled and collapsed to the ground where the red lights crossed, with bloody holes shot into their bodies.

  When the more robust magical creatures took to the frontlines to shield the others with their magic-resistant bodies, the Crimson adepts behind the walls would drown them with ferocious magic.

  Testing the might of human adepts with crude skin and flesh was an unfair test to begin with!

  However, this unfair scene occurred again and again on this chaotic battlefield.

  Most beasts fell during their charge. Even the occasional fortunate creature that made it to the wall would be met with a row of magical machines forged of pure metal.

  Magical machines and elementium golems were powerful guards that almost every official adept within the Crimson Clan possessed. These machines were steel shields, while the elementium golems were explosive weapons. They had both become irreplaceable assistants of the Crimson adepts.

  It was impossible to charge up to a Crimson adept’s side before first beating their machine and their golem!

  While blood was spilled in the basin, the seven Second Grades of the Crimson Clan were calmly standing in front of the tent at the center of the fort, assessing the battle from afar.

  Dragonborn Zacha, Goblin Tigule, Blood Knights Soros and Windsor, Blood Elf Isa (Mage), Lilia (Magic Archer), Spalla (Shapeshifter).

  As the core fighting force of the Crimson Clan, these seven Second Grades represented Greem, the goblin faction, and the vampire faction respectively. They were already the strongest force of the Crimson Clan, excluding the few top-tier adepts of the clan.

  They knew very well that these wild beasts did not qualify to assault the White Tower if they could not even break through a fort such as this. The surface reason the Crimson Clan had chosen this place to fend off the stampede was to reduce the pressure around White Tower, but in truth, it was an internal selection and elimination of the clan.

  Over the past few days, many new adepts had risen to power in the Crimson Clan. The higher-ups were intending to use this stampede as a means of sifting out the elites. As such, these Second Grades were only here as the last line of defense. The ones who were truly embroiled in the deathmatch were the First Grade adepts and apprentices.

  They were the true protagonists of this battle!

  Chapter 897 - One Corner of the Battlefield

  Chapter 897 One Corner of the Battlefield

  Adept Locke was incredibly busy!

  As a newly advanced adept, Little Locke relied on his expert magical machine manipulation techniques to quickly ascend as a celebrity combat adept in White Tower.

  Locke had been assigned to the left side of the fort for this battle. He led a group of two hundred goblins in defense of a fifty-meter stretch of the wall. The two other adepts that had been assigned to the same area were Blood Elf Archer Sandor and Human Adept Adreica.

  Judging by this assignment alone, it was apparent that every zone of defense was made up of a team o
f adepts from all the major factions.

  While he was engaged in battle, Little Locke’s mind kept thinking back to the things that the goblin hero, Tigule, had secretly told him. Tigule not only told him about the real purpose behind this stampede defense, but he also told him to perform to the best of his abilities and increase the reputation of the goblin faction.

  It was his awareness of the situation that made Goblin Adept Locke behave so courageously and selflessly in battle. He was also curious whether Blood Elf Archer Sandor had also received the news of this ahead of time. Why else would a long-ranged magic archer like herself behave so aggressively on the battlefield?

  Little Locke did not choose to hide in the fort but instead came to its exterior. A strange, two-meter tall magical machine golem was running beside him, exceedingly active and surprisingly lethal in battle.

  This magical machine did not make use of the same dome-shaped metal body like the other magical machines. Instead, it was constructed with a relatively primitive and crude wind-up clockwork system. Not many parts of its body were covered with metal pieces, leaving much of the internal construction exposed to everyone’s eyes.

  It shambled about the battlefield with its wild, penguin-like movements, occasionally transforming into all sorts of slaughter weapons.

  If the enemy were too far away, it would creak and transform into a smoking goblin tank, bombarding the opponent from a distance with its powerful magic energy cannons. If the enemy charged into mid-range, it would creak as it turned into an Archer, disrupting the enemy’s movements with fast and rapid gunfire.

  If the enemy continued rushing ahead, it would turn into a two-meter tall wind-up goblin, engaging in melee with hooks and chainsaws. It would even fire out goblin rockets to destroy the enemy at close range.

  It was the protection of this magical machine that allowed Little Locke to remain uncontested on the battlefield.