Adventurers and mercenaries like this were a common sight in a border region like Lakeside Town.
Both the savage werewolves of the forest and the orcs of the north had handsome bounties in the Zambez Empire, thereby attracting many hunters who overestimated their abilities. These adventurers were frequent guests of the tavern, and Ol’ Willy was more than familiar with their kind and how they dressed.
“You’re an unfamiliar face. You just arrive in Lakeside Town?” Ol’ Willy quickly poured a mug of Thunderbeer and slid it down the counter to the man in the black cloak, “This one’s on me!”
Greem took down his hood and put on a bright, gentle smile as he raised the mug and cheered, “Thank you! Cheers to your health!”
Fluent and local Zambezian came out of Greem’s mouth when he spoke.
Ol’ Willy couldn’t help but be stunned for a moment when he saw the young man’s long crimson hair, white skin, tall nose, and black eyes. He scratched his head as he said, “Are you from the north of the Empire? We don’t often see people that look like you over here!”
Greem smiled and didn’t answer the question. He simply ordered some stew and started eating in the corner of the tavern.
While Greem was eating and thinking about his next step forward, a commotion came from the distance, accompanied by the loud sound of warning bells.
“Goddamit! It must be those beholders again.” Ol’ Willy cursed under his breath as he walked to the door and looked in the direction of the stone bridge.
He was instantly stunned with shock.
The stone fortress on the other end of the stone bridge was not only in flames and smoking, but was blaring with the sound of warning bells. All the civilians of Lakeside Town emerged from their homes and looked at the stone fortress in the distance with concerned and worried faces.
The stone fortress was the only military facility outside of town. One hundred and fifty imperial soldiers lived within, ensuring the safety of the town throughout the year.
However, smoke signals were now rising from the fortress. That was not a good sign.
Town Mayor Gandas hastily rushed out of the town hall. He led two of his subordinates and ran toward the stone fortress, all while shouting at Ol’ Willy.
“Ol’ Will, stop staring. Hurry up and gather all the young people in the town and have them wait for orders. I will lead some people to check out the situation!”
Having said that, he left in a hurry.
Ol’ Willy hesitated for a moment and shivered when he turned back.
The young man from earlier was standing behind him all of a sudden, lifting his head and gazing at the smoke in the distance.
“I’m sorry, young man, but I’ll have to close my tavern for the moment. If you really are an adventurer, then please do stay and help our Lakeside Town. I am anxious that the enemy this time will be extremely dangerous.”
Greem completely ignored this old man with his barrel-like physique. Instead, his eyes were fixed on the distance.
Elementium fluctuations.
Greem could sense an intense elementium flux coming from the distance where the smoke rose. There was a faint feeling of something familiar.
According to Greem’s understandings, casters did not exist in significant numbers in Henvic Plane. Moreover, this elementium flux seemed discordant with the power system of this plane, seemingly as if…it was the magic of an adept.
Greem narrowed his eyes.
He had clearly seen that the Deceit Witches had crashed in two completely different directions while they were traversing the spatial rift; they couldn’t have hurried over in such a short time to meet with him. That was why Greem felt no sense of intimacy from this unexpectedly familiar flux of power. Instead, he felt a bad omen.
Friend or foe? A coincidental crossing of paths, or someone headed straight for him?
Greem turned, left the tavern without hesitation, and sprinted out of town away from the direction of the smoke.
Ol’ Willy could only shake his head and sigh when he saw this. He quickly moved his fat body down the streets to gather the young folks.
There were over two thousand people in the town. Apart from the old, the sickly, and the young, he could still easily pull together a group of seven to eight hundred young men. They didn’t know the situation outside of town either. They could only hold clubs, pitchforks, and torches in their hands as they blockaded the bridge and waited for news with bated breath.
Dawn came, and the gravel road leading to the stone fortress was now engulfed in a layer of light mist, making it difficult to see into the distance.
All of a sudden, a pained cry came from the distance as a stumbling figure charged onto the bridge with a torch in hand.
“It’s York.”
“Go check it out. It’s York. He went with the mayor earlier.”
Some of the townspeople had sharp eyes and quickly recognized the man who was hastily running back toward them.
“York, what happened at the stone fortress?” A muscular man emerged from the crowd and asked loudly.
“Dead, dead…they are all dead. The mayor…” York exasperated as he stumbled forward.
A sharp whistling sound suddenly rang out from within the mist.
A strange disc-shaped blade flew out, wrapping around York’s neck before it flew back into the fog.
York’s body froze as the head on his neck fell to the ground before rolling into the crowd.
The crowd stepped back from the head, their faces green from shock and fear. Shouts and screams started to ring out throughout the crowd.
A small and slender silhouette slowly appeared from the mist. Five or six strange appendages waved around her.
It was a strange woman that walked out of the mist, half human and half machine. She wore fine and fancy black combat armor. Half of her skin and face were still human, but the other half had been replaced with strange silver metal.
The most striking feature on the cold, hard lines of her faces was the pair of glowing red mechanical eyes.
“She’s…she’s from the other world. She’s a witch!” The experienced Ol’ Willy stepped backward in terror, his voice sharp enough to shatter the eardrums of the people around him.
A witch? She’s a witch?
This horrifying news instantly terrified the townspeople to their core.
Otherworldly witches had invaded Henvic Plane. That was news that every citizen of the Zambez Empire knew. However, the holy knights of the Empire had already surrounded the witches at Dabyrie Highlands. It was said that they had almost exterminated every last one of them.
How was it possible for them to appear here, at the northernmost end of the Empire in Lakeside Town?
Several of the more cowardly townsfolk immediately turned to run. However, the half-machine witch let out a shriek as four terrifying disc-blades instantly flew out and cut them in half.
Their remains collapsed to the ground, the thick scent of blood and the frightening gore causing many of the civilians to pass out directly.
“Stand there. No one move!” Blade Princess Katherine casually walked forward as she threatened loudly, “Anyone runs again, and you will end up like them.”
All of the civilians retreated to the sides of the stone bridge and made a wide path for the witch.
“I am searching for a person. If any of you can tell me his location, I can spare you your life.”
Blade Princess Katherine took out a crystal ball and activated it with her magical power, projecting the image of a tall and handsome young man into the air. Judging by the facial features, the garb, and the physique, there was no doubt that it was Greem.
Several of the people in the crowd had seen Greem at the entrance of the tavern. They immediately recognized him and couldn’t help but look toward Ol’ Willy.
Katherine’s spiritual senses were extremely sharp. She instantly noticed the looks of the people directed at the short and fat Willy. Several buzzing metal blades approac
hed Ol’ Willy, driving back the crowd and trapping him in the middle.
“You’ve seen this man?” A strange smile appeared on Katherine’s cold and frozen face.
“I’ve…seen him.”
“Where is he?”
“He…he went…”
Just as Ol’ Willy was about to point into the distance, a quick fireball flew out of the mist and landed on him.
A loud explosion rang out as Ol’ Willy exploded like a barrel of wine. The flame shockwave evaporated his blood before it could even land.
The civilians immediately scattered in terror, their screams and cries filling the town.
Katherine couldn’t be bothered with these boring gnats. Instead, her mechanical eye creaked as she slowly locked onto the towering figure stepping out of the fog from the other end of the stone bridge.
“Greem.” Katherine put on a sinister smile, “I thought you would be running with all you have! You dare to step up so voluntarily?”
“Run? Why would I run?” Greem brushed aside the mist and stopped a hundred meters away from Katherine as he smiled and said, “You are Third Grade, as am I. Neither of us can use our full strength in this god-forsaken place, so why should I fear you?”
“Because you are an elementium adept, and I am a mechanical adept!” Blade Princess Katherine’s crimson mechanical eye glowed even brighter, “The effects of this other plane are more significant against you. Moreover, I am a hunter adept!”
Katherine’s metal boots abruptly stomped against the ground, and her petite body no taller than 1.6 meters shot out like an arrow toward Greem.
Her metallic appendages lashed forward as five glowing metal blades slashed at Greem from various angles.
Chapter 944 - Small Town Doomsday
The blade-discs spun furiously as the winds blew violently.
Blade Princess Katherine fighting at full force was like a metal hedgehog, spinning wildly around Greem. Her sharp metal hand blades caused Greem’s Inferno Shields to loudly crackle as they struck over and over.
Meanwhile, the metal blades spinning around her were slicing into Greem’s defensive spells as well. An Inferno Shield with over three hundred and fifty points of power was reduced to cinders in less than three seconds.
Fortunately, Greem had created seven of these Inferno Shields all at once. Thus, he barely managed to hold on until he cast the next spell.
Due to the existence of the planar suppression and the difference in planar laws, the instant-cast spells of the past now required two to three seconds of chanting and hand gestures to activate. That was why elementium adepts were at a natural disadvantage in close combat, with far less fluid and natural movements compared to Katherine’s mechanical magic.
Flame Pillar!
A Flame Pillar smashed outward with Greem as the center, the stone tiles beneath his feet rapidly softening and melting from the extreme heat. Soon, the tiles had turned into flowing magma.
Even with her resistances, Katherine did not dare to fight Greem within such ferocious flames.
Her athletic body abruptly flickered forty meters away and avoided the most concentrated region of the Flame Pillar’s power. Meanwhile, her bright, silver right hand opened wide with the palm pointed at Greem. Her fingers moved slightly, still controlling the five spinning metal blades in the air.
These five metal blade-discs were made out of an extraordinary material. They were unaffected by Greem’s elementium flames and continued to tackle and slice at his last two remaining Inferno Shields.
Greem let out a cold grunt and pointed with his hand. An Inferno Wall suddenly rose between him and the Blade Princess, separating the stone bridge into two halves. He let out a battlecry and transformed into a five-meter tall Flame Fiend. His hand of magma reached into the air and grabbed two of the metal blades.
Though the metal blades had been restrained, they were still rampant and ferocious weapons with a tremendous capacity for harm.
The blades continued to spin and shudder wildly, even in his hand of magma, as if they were trying their best to escape.
Greem couldn’t care for the intense, cutting pain from his hands. He put both palms together as barbaric fire energy surged toward the two metal blades. The two silver blades started to turn red from the flood of such violent fire energy, but they remained just as active as before.
Greem let out a yell and clapped his two hands together with all he had. The two red-hot metal blades ran into each other with tremendous force.
A loud snap rang out as thin cracks finally appeared on the blades. They disintegrated into shards of metal smaller than a finger.
Katherine also let out a grunt from the other side of the Inferno Wall. It was obvious that her Spirit, which had been attached to the metal blades, had also been damaged from the destruction.
Upon realizing that Greem had the ability to destroy her blades, Katherine made the three remaining blades quickly move away and avoid his catching hands.
While Greem seriously dealt with the attacks from the three spinning blades, flames suddenly splashed from the Inferno Wall. A silver metal spike pierced through the wall and ran through his left shoulder. The metal spikes had actually been aimed at Greem’s heart. He had only managed to avoid the lethal attack by dodging just in time.
Greem let out a howl in agony and raised his hand to destroy this metal spike as he had done with the metal blades. However, a tearing sound rang out as the metal spike pulled out of his wound like a fish, ripping a nasty gash in his arm as it did so.
Red lava immediately flowed from the wound, dripping onto the sturdy stone bridge below and burning large holes into the material.
It was then that Greem noticed a finger-thick silver chain attached to the end of the spike. The Blade Princess Katherine had controlled the metal spike through this chain.
Katherine promptly lunged the moment the seven-second-long Inferno Wall ended. She slashed with her blades, stabbed with her spikes, or weaved around with her hand blades. Her mechanical body was like an armory of its own, having undergone so many modifications. All sorts of strange offensive weapons could shoot out and appear at any time and from any position.
Compared to an elementium adept, all her attacks required no chants or no elementium molding. They fired at her mere thought, and each and every one of them was incredibly powerful. A weapon that could be collected by a Third Grade mechanical adept and placed within her body could not possibly be a mediocre product!
It didn’t matter whether it was the metal blades, the metal spikes, or even her hand blades. All of them glowed with magical power, clearly enhanced and reinforced with all sorts of anti-magic capabilities.
Piercing. Slashing. Sharpen. Reinforcement. Armor Penetration.
Almost all offensive effects that Greem had heard of were on the Blade Princess’ magical weapons. If it weren’t for the accumulation of all these devastating effects, the metal weapons would never have been able to pierce Greem’ layers of Inferno Shields and magma armor to harm him, regardless of how sharp and durable they were.
One had to admit that most of Katherine’s abilities truly countered elementium adepts.
The modification through mechanical magic had allowed Katherine’s own magical resistances to reach a shocking level as well. Moreover, she had obviously and intentionally improved her fire resistance for this trip. Consequently, Greem’s area-of-effect fire spells were almost entirely useless against her. Only reinforced single-target fire spells could pose a threat to her!
Moreover, her powerful anti-magic and defense-penetration abilities caused most of Greem’s defensive spells to be ineffective. There were many times where Greem had to use some desperate means that harmed even himself to force Katherine away.
It had not even been fifteen minutes since they had started fighting, but it was already turning out to be a grueling and painful fight for both sides.
Katherine was burnt all over and gasping for breath, while Greem’s magma body was litt
ered with cuts and wounds, with him appearing in faltering spirits.
Greem had also discovered some problems with his abilities through this fight.
Some problems that he, as a high-grade adept, needed to take note of!
Compared to low and mid-grade adepts, high-grade adepts–particularly combat adepts or hunter adepts that specialized in murder as Katherine did–no longer pursued fancy spells with demonstrable and immense power. Instead, they preferred fast, concentrated, and more rapid means of death.
During his battle with Katherine, Greem had only seen her repeat the same few methods of attacking. He had never seen her cast an area-of-effect spell that required any chanting or handsigns. All of her attacks were simple, direct, barbaric, and violent in the sole pursuit of instantaneous explosive power and unpredictability in its offense.
Greem was not used to such a style of combat at all. There were quite a few times where he had to endure Katherine’s attacks as he squeezed out a powerful high-grade spell. It undoubtedly gave the opponent even more chances to attack him!
Greem didn’t even dare to cast Fire Teleportation in his battle against Katherine. The half-second pause in his actions was enough of a window for the mechanical adept to strike him three times. Moreover, Greem couldn’t be sure that the short distance of the Fire Teleportation would allow him to break free from Katherine.
If she had a means of tracking short-ranged teleportation, Greem would pay a heavy price for attempting to do so!
As Third Grade adepts from another world, both of them experienced terrifying planar suppression, and their powers had been affected to some extent, large or small. Even so, the battle between the two adepts still left a devastating impact on this beautiful and peaceful Lakeside Town.
Wave after wave of flame shockwaves that radiated outward, one magma fireball after another, seas of fire that spread with the wave of a hand; all of these horribly damaged the small town.
Stretches of residential homes were ignited by the splashing Magma Fireballs, engulfing the entirety of Lakeside Town in a sea of crackling fire. The townsfolk cried out loud as they fled in every direction. A flame shockwave swept by, and everyone instantly collapsed, reduced to unrecognizable charred bones and dust on the spot.
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