Age of Adepts

Life on the flying ship was monotonous and boring.

Though there was magnificent scenery underneath, it eventually got boring, causing some to even turn a blind eye to it.

As the deck was packed with over three hundred apprentices, it was not a comfortable place to stay. But fortunately, around noon the next day, the flying ship had arrived at the first mission site, in the Erathia region.

It was a stronghold built in the middle of the mountains, fully surrounded by dangerous high peaks that stretched far into the sky. Clouds were floating within deep valleys, making sure no one could peak through them and get a glimpse at the ground below. The flying ship docked at a massive thirty-meter-tall tower in the center of a stronghold.

The entire tower was built with huge logs, all of each were at least half a meter thick. Although it looked rough and simple, it had a touch of solidarity that would give one the feeling that nothing could destroy it.

The flying ship didn’t land on the ground, but hovered on the side of the tower. A wood plank was placed between the ship and the tower, allowing apprentices to leave the ship. Wind Elementium was swirling around the flying ship violently, creating a small windstorm. Therefore, all apprentices who needed to disembark here would have to withstand the strong wind as they walked along the trembling wood plank before arrived at the top of the tower. As the result, when each and every single apprentice walked on the wood plank, their heart was trembling just like the wooden plank.

Lying on the side of the ship, Greem glanced down beneath the flying ship. He saw numerous hardworking figures within the stronghold.

No matter whether it was the masculine guy carrying huge wooden logs and walked through the empty field, or the guards who had bows and arrows on their back and spear in hand as they patrolled the top of the outer wall, the majority of them were not human. Some had the heads of lions, some had the heads of tigers, and others the heads of wolves. They were not human.

Humans only accounted for a small portion of the population of this place, and most of them were supervisors.

Looking at these weak human supervisors, a few of whom were waving their whips and yelling at a ferocious looking ‘beast man’, who was far larger than them, Greem couldn’t help but be impressed with their courage. Judging from the muscles of these beast-men, perhaps even without using any weapon they could easily squeeze and crush these supervisors’ head with a single hand! However, these supervisors showed no signs of fear, instead, they held their heads high, yelling and scolding these beast men as if they were lowly ants.

Also, from time to time, people wearing the gray robe of Apprentice Adepts would appear around the stronghold. Their status was clearly higher than the human supervisors. Wherever they went, those human supervisors would bow to them act in a flattering manner, while the masculine, tall beast men would have frightened expressions appear on their faces as they clumsily bowed to the Apprentice Adepts.

Most likely these beast men were slaves brought from some secondary Planes which had been conquered by Adepts! No wonder they were acting so tame!

Greem suddenly realized something.

Although these beast-men had great physical strength and constitution, and tall, muscular bodies, they didn’t possess any supernatural powers. So, they didn’t have any way of countering apprentice Adepts who had mastered mystical forces. Perhaps, even a beginner apprentice could kill dozens of beast men without too much trouble. That’s was probably the reason why they were so respectful to apprentice Adepts.\

Actually, this place was considering a small mission site, and only around twenty to thirty apprentices left the ship. Most of them were intermediate apprentices, and two were advanced apprentices. No Pseudo-Adepts left the ship.

Soon, under the submissive yet numbed glances of countless beast men, the flying ship once again ascended into the sky, flying along the steep and rough mountains as it continued heading South.

…

After passing countless mountains and rivers and a vast virgin forest that stretched tens of thousand miles, the flying ship finally arrived at another human colony. The slope of the terrain gracefully flattened out, and large scale of human activities could be found around the place. But too bad, as most of the mission sites picked by Zhentarim Association were at the borders of the colony, the ship never went too deep into the heart of the Erathia region. Instead, it turned its nose, started to fly along the edge of the colony.

Over the next two days, the ship visited five mission sites. Nearly half of the apprentices had left the ship by this point. The third day after Greem boarded the ship, it adjusted its course to South West and left the Erathia region, quickly approaching the Bracada region.

Compared to the warm sunny days in Erathia, Bracada was simply a world covered by freezing snow.

As the flying ship entered the region, the greenery started to diminish, being quickly replaced by a boundless land of white snow.

Pure white snowflakes were swirling in the air as the temperature started to drop significantly.

Some apprentices with high Physique still had their shirt loosened, happily exposed their ripped muscles. On the flipside, those with low Physiques had pulled their robes tight, using all kind of methods to keep warm.

As Greem only had a Physique of 5, he hadn’t reached the level where he could ignore this extreme cold. Hence, he summoned Fire Elementium and had it hover around his body, warming him up.

But fortunately, the flying ship never visited the deepest area of this realm of ice and snow, but kept flying along it’s edge. It visited three snowy remote towns along its way, and, by the end, had dropped off most of the apprentices.

As the flying ship turned its nose and adjusted its course to fly East, there were less than fifty apprentices left on the deck. Five Pseudo-Adepts, twenty-seven advanced apprentices, thirteen intermediate apprentices, and the one and only beginner apprentice, Greem.

After spending a couple of days on the ship, with regards to the world outside the Magical Swamp, Greem was no longer as ignorant as before.

The world Greem was currently living in was an Adept World named ‘Lethon’.

Throughout the entire multiverse, the Plane of Lethon was a rather rare major scale Plane. It was a Plane with a single political system, led by Adepts, which made it a pure Adept world. Their enemies were other major scales Planes. For example, the Plane of the Gods, which was guarded by deities; the Plane of the Dragon, which was protected by Divine Dragons; The Plane of the Gnomes, which was a highly advanced mechanical civilization; The Dark Plane, which was filled with foul demons and evil spirits…

All major scale Plane had mature civilizations. The Adept World of Lethon had established a complete framework for Adept development, with it, batch after batch of qualified and powerful Adepts were cultivated. Afterwards, they used these new Adepts to expand their territory, invading intermediate and small-scale Planes.

In order to seize the resources and intellectual property of different Planes, there would be violent conflicts and wars between all major Planes. Therefore, if one wanted to describe it, the Adept World was a powerful and aggressive civilization that loved engaging in wars.

This was the current state of the Adept World’s foreign ‘policies’. Internally, there wasn’t a single clan powerful enough to unify all the Adepts. Thus, according to territories and regions, many clans of Adept had formed. Among them, four of them held the most dominate positions.

The Northern Witches occupied the northern region of the Adept Mainland, controlling a land that covered more than six million square kilometers, which was then divided into dozens of human kingdoms of all sizes. The rulers and nobles of these kingdoms were ordinary humans, but they all recognized the Northern Witches as the guardians of their kingdoms.

In fact, whenever a mighty female Fourth Grade Adept came into power amongst the Northern Witches, she would call upon a group of followers and venture out into the vast wilderness, blazing her way through all manners of obstacles and established a great kingdom that would only belong to her.

Relying on the constantly emerging, powerful female Adepts, the Northern Witches were constantly fighting for living space in this savage world. Whenever a new kingdom was born, and a magnificent Adept Tower was built, it also meant that another Female Adept has risen to power.

The Northern Witches were experts in Curses and Prophesy, thus they were all Principle Adepts.

The South West side of the Adept Mainland was mainly the territory of the Silver Alliance.

Strictly speaking, it was the haven for Profound Adepts.

The Silver Alliance was made from a group of Profound Adepts who were notable for always wearing silver robes. Using alchemical knowledge and resources gathered from countless Planes, they constructed a magnificent and majestic floating city in the sky and countless fortresses which they used to invade new Planes.

In brief, most of the crafted weapons used by the Adept World when invading new Planes were supplied by the Silver Alliance. They were like a group of crazy, yet amazing, engineers, machinists, and alchemists. Using massive amounts of resources and tremendous knowledge, they invented all sorts of creatively crafted machines, providing the Adept World with powerful devices.

The eastern region of the Adept Mainland was the territory of the United Adept Association. Nearly all kinds of Adepts could be found in this association. By utilizing a systematic cultivation road map, and a shareable knowledge system, it had attracted many Adepts who possessed powerful abilities. These Adepts had formed an association governed by strict rules, yet emphasizing impartiality.

Aside from these three major Adept associations and clans, within the center of the Adept Mainland, which was also the region with the densest population, there was a rather loosely organized Adept association: The Zhentarim Association. Honestly speaking, unlike the other three major Adept forces, the Zhantarim Association didn’t have a clear direction of development or core bond between its members. It was more like a consortium of Adept families.

Actually, it had something to do with how Adept forces were distributed in the center of the Adept Mainland.

The center region of Adept Mainland was a vast land with abundant resources, but the human colonies here were scattered. Each human colony was a small kingdom, usually guarded by at least one Adept family. Therefore, the center region was made up by many Adept Families.

In order to counter the invasion from all three major Adept forces toward the center region, Adept families of all sizes had grouped together and formed the Zhantarim Association, combining their might to ensure they maintained their place in the world.

Therefore, the Adept forces that Zhentarim Association could call upon were definitely stronger than the other three surrounding forces, making them the strongest of the three. But, unfortunately, as the internal workings of the Zhantarim Association were quite loose, and there were too many different families, which prompted many internal rivalries, whenever they were in a battle, the Zhentarim Association could never be as effective as the other three major forces.

In light of this, the newly elected top management of the Zhantarim Association had decided to strengthen the intensity of their Apprentice Adept training, and thus Greem was forced to face this dangerous training mission.