Age of Adepts c1-1513

by Zhen De Lao Lang, 真的老狼

  On the edge of the battlefield.

  Several explosions rang out.

  Ice erupted, and cold air seeped outward.

  Greem, Kanganas, and Tulas broke free of their ice encasements and appeared in the palace once more. Sand King had already burrowed underground, avoiding the terrifying attack altogether. Meanwhile, Medusa Sshina had been frozen solid on an ice pillar by the Frost Breath. She could not move a single inch and remained still, like a sculpture of ice.

  She did not have Sand King’s overwhelming Strength that could allow her to break free of the ice with sheer physical force. However, a burst of light flashed, and the frost on Sshina’s body was cast off to the ground as gray dust.

  Sshina opened her mouth slightly and spat out blood after freeing herself. She glanced furiously at the skeletal dragon through the mist of ice before flickering out of sight.

  Greem did not send Shadow Demon out to attack the ice dragon on such a chaotic battlefield. Instead, he kept Shadow Demon close by his side to protect him.

  Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax had clearly managed to assimilate the Ancient Reliquary to some extent. The fearsome power he possessed was no longer comparable to that of a Fourth Grade creature. Standing out too much while fighting an opponent as powerful as this would risk drawing attacks towards himself.

  That was something that Greem absolutely hoped to avoid!

  That said, it was a good idea to demonstrate some degree of effort and contribution to the party.

  Greem waved his staff, and a hundred fireballs formed in an instant. They howled and crashed towards the skeletal dragon within the mist.

  The commotion and ferocity of the attack were so great that everyone’s attention uncontrollably turned towards it.

  The skeletal dragon, who had just unleashed its breath and was surveying the room for any surviving enemies, instantly saw the fireballs. Two bright, chilling beams shot out of the mist and landed on Greem.

  The next second, the mist burst apart.

  Nax charged forward with its mighty body, opened its maw, and snapped at Greem.

  One was a giant, thirty-meter-long, twelve-meter-tall, and fifty-ton skeletal ice dragon.

  The other was a mere human, two meters tall, and no more than a hundred kilograms in weight.

  If these two individuals collided, the only possible result was the human’s absolute defeat, crushed into the ground and turned into paste!

  Greem wasn’t so foolish as to clash with such a gigantic creature head-on. He leaped away with Fire Teleportation and appeared in a different corner of the palace, a thousand meters away.

  The moment he appeared, he waved his staff and summoned a massive Scarlet Firestorm at the dragon’s location.

  The skeletal ice dragon was simply too huge. Naturally, its size made it less agile.

  It had just turned around and locked onto Greem’s new position when the Firestorm erupted, with it at the very center.

  A thick pillar of fire rose to the ceiling, its blazing flames engulfing everything within three hundred meters. The extreme heat and flames ignited everything in their radius. Even the air and the ice crystals began burning.

  As a top-class fire adept, Greem could freely imbue every single one of his fire spells with the corresponding fire laws. Of course, to injure a giant monster like Nax, Fire Penetration was necessary for each and every attack!

  Without the laws of fire, the most ferocious of flames could not injure Nax, even if they were to burn the dragon for several months.

  Only flames imbued with law power could penetrate the ice mist surrounding Nax and slowly inflict fire damage on its skeletal body.

  Of course, the damage being inflicted was minimal.

  However, Greem wasn’t Nax’s only enemy.

  While the skeletal ice dragon was furiously chasing after Greem, a large cloud of death energy and several unusual void runes landed on its body.

  Where the death energy spread, the ice crystals melted and the cold dissipated.

  The bones engulfed by the death energy instantly turned pale white. The dragon’s bone spikes and ice forcefield started to sizzle and turn black.

  The void runes were even more mysterious. They completely ignored the skeletal dragon’s defenses and drifted into its bones, causing the ice energy in its body to turn volatile.

  If it wasn’t for the terrifying ice forcefield in Nax’s body, and his powerful Spirit that neutralized part of the void damage, Tulas might have been able to scatter the ice energy in the dragon’s body into terrifying chaos energy.

  Chaos energy was a vicious poison for any planar creature!

  The poison of energy!

  Nax reared its neck and let out a loud roar. A hint of pain could be heard in its cry.

  Four hundred years. It had been four hundred years since the last time it had felt pain.

  A group of bastards had broken into its place, injured its noble body, and were plotting to steal its most precious treasure.

  Nax could no longer suppress its anger at the thought of that. It wanted to use its merciless dragon breath to turn its enemies into ice sculptures and personally crush them to pieces with its body.

  Nax roared furiously. Blue light gleamed in its eyes as powerful ice energy immediately filled the entire palace.

  Once as hard as steel and smooth as a mirror, the floor of the palace began to shake violently and undulate as if a wave was passing through the ground.

  Ice spikes pierced out of the floor, instantly turning the hall into a sea of ice clusters.

  The towering clumps of ice took up most of the palace’s space and obscured everyone’s vision. The countless reflections from the ice surfaces disoriented the invaders, making it difficult for them to determine the skeletal dragon’s genuine position.

  The mist of ice that filled the hall also had the effect of weakening and refracting Spiritual senses. It effectively suppressed the senses of the invaders.

  This place was Nax’s home field, after all.

  It couldn’t be any more familiar with every inch of space in this palace. It knew every curve and every corner down to the very last detail. When everyone’s senses were obscured, the invaders would lose their numerical and strategic advantage as a team, while Nax would be able to hunt them down freely.

  Sshina, who was the weakest of them all, was instantly on edge. Her hissing snake-hair flicked their forked tongues, helping her watch over every possible direction from which the enemy could approach.

  She concealed her own aura and silently slithered across the ceiling.

  The forest of ice clusters beneath her was shrouded in mist. Tens of thousands of silhouettes moved between the ice crystals. It was impossible to tell which were real and which were only reflections, and even more impossible to tell where everyone’s actual position was.

  Starspirit Tulas’ body transformed into a cloud glowing with an unusual, dark light. He slowly merged with the ice mist and vanished without a trace.

  Greem laughed at the sight of this. Fire blazed around him as he vanished from sight, protected by the law of Invisible Flames.

  In the blink of an eye, Kanganas became the only person left in the room!

  Chapter 1265 - Encircled Dragon

  God bloody dammit!

  If it weren’t for the thousands of years of desolation and cold wearing away all of Kanganas’ emotions and feelings, he would be furiously cursing at these teammates of his.

  Dammit! He was a caster!

  If everyone was hiding, was he supposed to be the one to face that unreasonable dragon!?

  Kanganas hadn’t finished insulting his teammates in his mind when his soulfire trembled abruptly.

  Dammit! That skeletal dragon’s here.

  His surroundings were still shrouded in mist and covered in ice crystals.

  Even as ‘slender’ as he was, Kanganas would have trouble traveling through all the ice clusters.

  The forest of ice clusters was still as silent as before.
The mist drifted quietly. Kanganas could not sense any change around him.

  However, even though he could not see the skeletal dragon’s body or hear its footsteps, he could feel the dragon’s unusual aura of cold thicken. It was so cold that even his soulfire shrank and shivered.

  Kanganas raised the short white bone staff in his hand without any hesitation. A cloud of death energy engulfed everything within a hundred meters, causing all substances within the radius to sizzle loudly.

  In particular, the ice crystals started to rot and turn black before crumbling into dust. Even the ice mist had lightened up, faintly revealing what was around him.

  A hulking creature glowing with blue light suddenly appeared from the mist, roaring and charging at Kanganas.

  Kanganas waved his staff over and over. Several massive figures appeared, standing in the way of the skeletal dragon’s charge.

  The first was a beginner Fourth Grade bone dragon, accompanied by two beginner Fourth Grade Scourge Knights and an intermediate Fourth Grade greater lich.

  They could all feel the skeletal dragon’s overwhelming aura of might, along with its devastating ferocity. If Kanganas had not forcefully commanded the bone dragon to intercept the skeletal dragon, it would never have done such a foolish thing.

  Unfortunately, as the soul-bound servant of a lich, sacrificing its own body to defeat the enemy was the only option that the bone dragon had.

  A deafening sound rang out as the two skeletal dragons of imbalanced sizes collided with each other.

  A force shockwave rippled outwards. All creatures significantly smaller than the dragons were uncontrollably lifted off their feet and blown away from the battlefield.

  The next second, shattered bits of dragon bone and dust-like shards of ice howled as they flew outwards. An odd crackling sound could be heard as the ice pillars nearby were hit and pierced by the shrapnel from the impact.

  Both Kanganas and his subordinate greater lich were also blown away. Only the bone dragon and the two Scourge Knights were able to remain on the battlefield.

  Massive shards of blue ice and ice dust settled to the ground and covered everyone beneath it.

  The violent force from the collision had shredded the surrounding space to pieces. Any Spirit that extended into the battlefield was torn apart, preventing anyone from seeing the clash’s result.

  A bone dragon and two Scourge Knights against the skeletal ice dragon Nax. Even though both parties were Fourth Grade, the massive difference in power could not be made up for with mere numbers.

  A short moment later, the battlefield abruptly fell silent.

  A massive dragon skull was hurled out of the mist, sliding a hundred meters across the cracked ice floor before coming to a pause. The eye sockets of the bone dragon were empty. Its soulfire had extinguished. It was thoroughly dead.

  Meanwhile, the two Scourge Knights were still lost in the mist of ice and had not appeared yet. Considering the gulf in power, it wasn’t hard to imagine their fates!

  Kanganas, who had drifted a thousand meters away, started shouting impatiently, “Sand King, I know you’ve recovered. Help me stop this creature immediately, at this very instant, or our deal is off.”

  It was only natural that Kanganas was so flustered. The Fourth Grade bone dragon might not be the strongest subordinate, but it was certainly one of his best and most elite servants.

  Now, it had sacrificed itself on the battlefield to absolutely no effect, along with two Scourge Knights. Even though he had lived for a thousand years, Kanganas felt the pain of this loss to his very core!

  These Fourth Grade undead servants were not common creatures that could be summoned en masse from the Skeletal Plane. In fact, many elite Fourth Grade servants were personally created by liches with their exceptional necromancy and alchemical abilities. This process often consumed extremely expensive materials and gems.

  Losing even a single one of these servants would make Kanganas upset for days. The fact that he had lost three of them at once felt like a dagger in his heart.

  However, no number of servants, no matter how expensive, could compare to his own life!

  When it came to a moment of life and death, Kanganas would have no hesitation in abandoning them.

  Perhaps sensing the lich’s ‘fury,’ Sand King emerged from the ground and once again stood in front of Kanganas.

  Kanganas was finally relieved now that a companion shielded him. He landed on the ground and started chanting rapidly with the aid of the Fourth Grade greater lich. They were preparing a powerful death spell.

  Energy rippled in the ice mist, and the roars of a dragon could be heard. It seemed like Nax was engaged in battle with the Medusa Sshina.

  It was a terrible and brutal fight!

  The next second, fire flashed inside the mist. Flames blazed as Greem quickly teleported forward and threw a vicious Fire Core Explosion into Nax’s chest cavity.

  A hell of ice and fire.

  Ice magic was a branch of water magic, to begin with. That branch of magic had always had an adversarial relationship with fire magic. That was why even Nax could feel that soul-penetrating agony when the flames roasted its bones.

  Nax let out another cry that tore the clouds apart. The next second, clouds of blue mist chased after a humanoid flame, carving out an empty path in the palace full of ice clusters.

  As the fires burned and the ice resisted, a massive void array appeared on the ground where the mist was the densest. Endless void energy gathered in the air, covering Nax’s mighty body with a layer of light.

  The next second, the void energy erupted!

  A portion of the ice energy in Nax’s body was disrupted and reduced to chaos energy, causing it to lose control over part of its body instantly.

  “Bastards…you damned bastards……I will……” The skeletal ice dragon cried out furiously but was quickly interrupted by another series of violent attacks.

  The entire palace turned into a slaughterhouse as attacks rained down on Nax. Large amounts of ice energy spilled out of Nax’s body, contaminating the nearby space and causing it to be incredibly chaotic.

  While his teammates occupied the skeletal dragon, Kanganas and his Fourth Grade lich subordinate managed to cast their spell. A Rain of Gloom began to fall from the sky onto the palace itself.

  The already downcast skies turned utterly dark.

  Black clouds rose from the ground and soon covered the entire sky.

  The light was so dim that it was almost impossible to discern anything. Pungent rainwater descended from the skies. The stench was nausea-inducing, but what was even more terrifying were the red splashes that appeared on the ground where the raindrops landed.

  It was not any ordinary rain. It was a rain of rotting blood.

  As the evil rain of blood continued to baptize the palace, the mist of ice was worn away, revealing the battlefield in its entirety. The ice clusters were also quickly melting in the rain, giving everyone more space to move and dodge.

  It had only been five minutes, but Sshina was already badly injured from the fighting. She had no choice but to grit her teeth and bow out of the battle.

  Her once pretty body was now covered in bruises as well as blue marks left behind by the invading ice energy. Much of her flesh had succumbed to the ice energy and had shattered to shards of ice, leaving wide gaps in her body.

  It was fortunate that this place was as cold as it was. Most of Sshina’s injuries were frozen, preventing a lethal loss of blood. Otherwise, given the number of holes that had appeared in her body, the loss of blood alone would have weakened Sshina tremendously.

  Her hair of snakes had mostly been frozen dead. The frozen snakes had shattered and turned into ice shards. Her long serpentine tail had also been severed in half. Even though what remained of her tail was clad in scales, it had still been inflicted with all sorts of cuts and gashes by the blades of ice and snow.

  Sshina slithered along the ground with her crippled tail. Every inch
of movement made Sshina grit her teeth in pain.

  Meanwhile, Sand King, who was enduring all the pressure from Nax alone, was also in a terrible state.

  His thick carapace was cracked everywhere. Every time he clashed with the skeletal dragon, black insectoid blood spilled onto the ground through these cracks, staining the ice floor beneath them.

  One of Sand King’s pincers had also been bitten off, while his proud stinger had been snapped in half; the broken part barely hung onto his body by some pieces of tissue and scale.

  In contrast, Greem and Tulas, who were spellcasters, were in a much better situation.

  They were constantly moving around on the edge of the battlefield.

  When they found the opportunity, they would teleport forward and unleash a devastating round of attacks. When the dragon seemed to turn its attention towards them, they would run away without hesitation. As for the honor and dignity of a Fourth Grade powerhouse…that stuff was best left to the ‘warriors’!

  A Rain of Gloom from above, a rotting ground below, and several Fourth Grade attacks surrounding it. The battle might be in a violent stalemate, but the overall situation was obviously in the invaders’ favor.

  The combination of five powerful evil individuals. Even as mighty as Skeletal Ice Dragon Nax was, it was difficult to endure such terrible pressure from every side.

  The battle was slowly starting to tilt in the invader’s favor!

  Chapter 1266 - To Each Their Own

  Ice Dragon Nax was very mighty indeed.

  However, its power was still insufficient to deal with a party of five powerful Fourth Grades.

  The main reason the battle seemed so ‘intense’ was simply because the members of the party were all holding back. They were cautious around each other and could not cooperate to the fullest extent.