Age of Adepts

The black panther crouched on the ground. Bill’s stomach pressed against the earth as he roared angrily.

But he didn’t dare to charge forward.

Just now;

Just then;

This terrifying being of flames that Bill thought he had correctly understood had conjured up a frightening surge of power. Its increased Strength and Agility hastened its clumsy and dull actions. It had suddenly gained power that it didn’t previously possess and smacked him away with a hilariously heavy Lava Shield.

If it wasn’t for the great Physique he gained from his transformation, that blow alone would have been enough to crush his skull and kill him.

The wound on his face was significant, but his regenerative speed, coupled with his eight points of Physique, was still extremely decent.

Bill roared once again. The fur on his paws started to disappear. His claws once again turned into human hands.

Bill endured the intense pain and snapped the shattered and twisted pieces of his nose back into place with his hands. With his powerful regeneration, the injuries on his face healed at a rate visible to the naked eye.

Self-regeneration like this was extremely useful, but the pain he had to endure was also higher than if he had let it be.

Bill let out another resounding roar once he healed. Thick black fur filled his hands once again as sharply curved claws grew out.

The black panther paused for a moment before drawing strength into his limbs. Once more, he turned into a black shadow and sprinted around Greem.

Greem’s Flame Fiend form might have been massive, but it wasn’t clumsy. With the power of the pure fire energy surging from the Flame Fiend’s Heart driving his body, and the increased attribute to strengthen his blows, the four-meter giant fought with the black panther as if he was an apocalyptic demon from hell. On the one hand, he wielded the thick Lava Shield, and on the other, he brandished a twelve-meter long flame whip.

The terrifying power of the transformed fire adept caught all three adepts by surprise.

After all, their divination powers were only enough to see through Greem’s surface abilities. They were far from able to figure out all of his hidden cards!

On the other side of the battlefield, Amanda was screaming at Doris as she evaded the pursuit of the Infernal Tyrant.

”Go and help him, bitch! Do you want all three of us to die here?”

The spectating Doris couldn’t help but twitch at the curses hurled at her. Even though she wanted her two ’allies’ to be a little more beaten up, Amanda was right. Their plan of killing Alice would go up in flames the moment Bill faltered in his fight against the fire adept.

That was not a price that the two witches were willing to pay!

If Alice was acknowledged as one of the three most likely candidates for the Witch of Fate, then the blessing she had from fate was most definitely stronger than either of theirs. This was not a situation they could stand!

Even though Doris didn’t have a ’brother’ that listened to her every whim and desire, her fortune was no weaker than Amanda’s. As long as they could kill the more powerful Alice and turn it into a duel between the two of them, Doris believed herself to have a decent chance of winning.

Doris lifted her head and looked at the battlefield, then shook her black robe. She extended a right hand filled with mysterious runic lines, and her fingers started to wave. An invisible ripple spread through the air as she softly chanted the profound words of her spell. The ripples made their way towards the Flame Fiend, who was furiously chasing after the Black Panther.

Greem brandished the flame whip about and smashed the scorched earth into pieces with every blow. As the black panther was just a little too fast, none of the lightning-quick strikes could catch its shape. All of them missed and hit the ground instead.

Still, the agile black panther didn’t dare pause for a moment. Bill constantly had to change positions and dodge. Even a slight delay would allow the flame whip to hit his body. The monstrous pain was only a secondary concern. The scarier possibility was the decrease in his speed.

That was because a decrease in speed would mean he would have to face a shield slam from the Flame Fiend. A shield attack with a Lava Shield that was as thick as a city wall.

Dammit, that wasn’t a shield! That was a hill burning with flames. Even he would have his bones snapped and broken if it hit him. It would hurt so much.

The invisible ripples finally reached Greem.

The Ring of Fire was utterly ineffective against the ripple. It did nothing to stop it. The situation was the same for the Lava Shield and the Inferno Shield. Even Greem’s flame body couldn’t prevent the ripples from entering his body.

Greem’s vision blurred. The black panther that had been running away from him suddenly split into two and ran in different directions. While he was still stunned by the change, the fleeing panthers once again divided into a total of four.

All four Panthers roared in unison and simultaneously turned to charge at Greem.

Greem waved his whip with all his strength. The flames instantly shattered two of the panther projections. The shield in his other hand had only barely raised up when air rippled across his left ribs and shoulder. Lava blood emitting intense heat spilled from the wounds.

Greem stomped his feet in anger. Countless pillars of lava rose around him. He took the opportunity to crouch and cover himself with the Lava Shield. Meanwhile, he scooped up a large handful of magma from the pool of lava beneath him and used it to seal his wounds.

”What’s going on? Is it an illusion or some sort of cloning ability? Chip, scan, quickly.” Greem silently roared in his heart as he treated his wounds.

”Beep. Unknown forcefield flux detected. Source of power is three hundred and sixteen meters behind the host. Forcefield flux will continuously affect host’s spatial senses. Recommend removal of forcefield source as soon as possible.”

Greem turned back abruptly.

He finally saw Doris casting her spell at the edge of the battlefield.

However, before he could even lock onto his opponent, his vision blurred once more. Everything in his sight became upside down and chaotic. It was a difficult task just to determine distance.

Greem concentrated his Spirit, and the Scroll of Voodoo appeared in his hand. At the same time, a Scarlet Firestorm exploded in the area he had locked on with his Spirit.

”Ah… Greem, what are you doing? Do you want to get rid of me as well?” Alice’s sharp voice rang out from the area being ravaged by the Firestorm.

Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!

Greem couldn’t help but curse repeatedly.

Even though he had already locked on to his enemy earlier, he couldn’t be sure if that ’enemy’ was Doris.

The effects of the illusions threw everything he saw and sensed into chaos. Some of the sensory inputs from the chaotic world were real, while others were false, and some others were distorted.

This sort of illusion, that mixed reality and truth with illusion and falsity, instantly plunged Greem into trouble.

He waved his shield and whip about, trying his hardest to chase after every illusion. Still, an intense pain would always throb on some part of his body every once in a while. Sharp claw marks had left no part of his body unharmed!

The moment of confusion would have been enough for Bill to critically wound Greem if it wasn’t for his wariness of a counterattack.

”Stand further away, Alice… ”

Greem quickly sent a mental message to Alice through their soul contract’s connection. He didn’t wait for a reply. Greem bent his body. The pages of the Scroll of Voodoo started to flip rapidly in his hands until they finally stopped on a page.

”Isatar, Haiman, World of Deep Red.”

Greem sang a few magical chants as he invoked a massive fire spell that devastated an area three hundred meters around him.

The dark and lightless sky was now entirely replaced by roiling black and red flame clouds. One after another, Magma Fireballs the size of a human head crashed towards the ground, dragging behind them a black tail of smoke as they fell.

Every fireball that hit the ground caused an intense explosion and a powerful shockwave. Of course, there were also the magma shards that flew in every direction and the rain of scalding magma.

Greem had been forced to do this. He had no other choice but to cast the only sizeable area-of-effect spell in the Scroll of Voodoo– Meteor Shower. Having lost his spatial senses, Greem knew that only a broad and indiscriminate bombarding like this one could interrupt the opponent’s Spiritual interference.

A short moment later, Greem’s Spirit trembled. His confused world had once again returned to normal!

A crashing Magma Fireball had landed five steps away from Doris. The explosion and following shockwave had snapped her out of her channeling. Greem had managed to break free of her illusion.

Doris’ black robe was burnt black by the surging flames. That said, the fire talisman on her neck still protected her from this minor amount of fire damage.

Her body trembled as blood came out of her mouth. It was the backlash from the interruption to her channeling.

This amount of damage was insufficient to cripple her. Greem’s blazing gaze, filled with rage and hatred, caused chills to run up her spine.

Dammit! I can’t let him break free from the effects!

Doris gripped the fire talisman on her chest and relied on it to resist the waves of rising flame. She ripped off the cloth from her right shoulder and revealed some strange runic arrays on her arm. She loudly chanted the words of her spell.

She might have been fast, but Greem wasn’t slow either!

For the first time in his life, Greem no longer dared to save the six instant-cast spells he had sealed in the Scroll of Voodoo. Without any rest, he immediately activated another single-target spell after the Meteor Shower. Fire Core Explosion.

Words and chants spilled out of Doris’ mouth. However, an intense feeling of death engulfed her body when she was two syllables away from the completion of her spell.

Dammit.

She couldn’t care about the activation of the illusion spell on her body. Doris instantly rolled sideways and frantically escaped into the distance without any regard for her dignity.

Boom! A muffled explosion rang throughout the battlefield.

The spot Doris had been standing on had turned a bright and blinding shade of red.

Massive amounts of fire elementium gathered in the place and compressed under the powerful effect of Greem’s spell. They then collapsed into a frightening black hole in the air. It was a black hole one meter in diameter. Right afterward, an unbelievably hot stream of flames blasted out from within like an endless tide. Everything within two meters of the explosion was instantly vaporized.

What a terrifying spell!